So I have been playing around with the idea of developing an app that would serve as an actual poll of what people like and dislike in their local or federal politics.
This is in response to the dog and pony show that is the current U.S. elections and the inevitable uprising in London. But essentially, if it were to work, a user can register and vote on candidates and take anonymous polls on policies. All that would be view-able to the public is the outcome. The only thing differentiating this from an online poll is the ability to certify if a user is actually authentic but I think this can be done by assigning random peers to police or "authenticate" new users. How does that sound, is this far fetched, has it been thought of, also what resources would be needed to get an alpha going?
Ask HN: Can a mobile app be made for true Democracy
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Re: Ask HN: Can a mobile app be made for true Democracy
#2The text as formatted is pretty difficult to read due to side scrolling.
Re: Ask HN: Can a mobile app be made for true Democracy
#3The text as formatted is pretty difficult to read due to side scrolling.
Done and done.
Re: Ask HN: Can a mobile app be made for true Democracy
#4Being able to game the system is a significant problem with online polls. I haven't looked into the issue deeply, but I think one of the strengths polling methods where the polling agency contacts people rather than the reverse is that it gives them a stronger guarantee that they're not being gamed. (Similar to you being less likely to be scammed by you calling your credit card company than picking up a call from someone claiming to be your credit card company.)
How about self-selection? Current polling reaches out to people, including those that may not otherwise participate in a poll. You'll be reaching only people who have the app installed, which will likely not completely represent the actual population.
Also off the top of my head: generally you'll want to tie polling to some geographic location. How do you verify this?
You might want to look into online voting systems, which, not without their own problems, try to address the security/anonymity/validity concerns.
I'm sure there's lots of information out there on how to do polling well. I'd probably start by looking at fivethirtyeight.com and their analysis of polls, if nothing else, to start becoming familiar with the space.
Good luck! Sounds like an interesting problem to tackle, and one that's worthwhile.