With a little spare time over the holiday weekend I enjoyed reading the expansive essays in Rebooting Democracy, a recent collection of essays from Personal Democracy Forum. As we celebrate the anniversary of our Independence ("booting" the British?), re-engaging with the ideals of our Republic seems appropriate.
The essays are quick reads and provide an array of sometimes contradictory opinions about the future of democracy in the Internet Age. For example, while some like Pablo de Real or Craig Newmark propose technology as a way to reinvigorate our democracy, danah boyd asks why we lack the motivation to engage as citizens, online or off.
On a related note, most of the sessions from the PdF 2008 (Rebooting the System) conference in June, are now posted on blip.tv and worth watching. The PdF website features post-conference feedback, a nice feature for those of us sifting through the posted materials.
