Last night I was explaining representative democracy in the digital age, in a bar, shouting over loud music, jaegerbomb in hand – because that’s how dull exciting I am!! Anyway, I thought it was good to write down here because it might help make sense of why everyone is banging on about digital democracy.
In the olden days men would ride to Parliament from towns and villages across the land, to bring the wishes of the people. They would return with news of what was happening in Parliament. And so representative democracy worked (in a very crude explanation!).
Nowadays the algorithms are the horses.
This is why marked up content, open data and social media – all the digital shizzle, is SO important for representative democracy.
And girls can ride algorithms too.
Emma Mulqueeny 
There was a bit about digital democracy (or at least online voting) on Daily Politics last week, with Estonia the poster-nation (only use for paper is in the toilet, said an advocate).
Unfortunately, the two UK MPs in the studio obviously didn’t have a clue about what it was or how it could best be harnessed.
Around 160k registered online on the UK’s voter registration campaign day n early Feb. How many of these turn out to vote is another matter.