Gary Johnson first expressed his interest in being among Presidential Candidates 2012 back in 2009. He formally announced he'd seek the Republican bid on Apr21'2011. He was barred from a number of the Republican Party debates. (more)

ex-Governor of New Mexico. (more)

I'm unlikely to vote for a major party candidate this time. I definitely will not vote for Barack Obama or anyone with a significant role in his administration.

Plugin for Word Press-multisite to support Social Networking (among the blogs on that server?) (more)

Teresa Torres: The "Why" Behind Product Feedback - Product Talk (more)

Khan Academy plans on using JavaScript as their Language For Learning Programming. We're in a very unique position as we're primarily aiming to teach students who've been through our previous math and science-centric curriculum. Because of this we can create some rather compelling exercises and projects that never would've been feasible otherwise... We want to go beyond basic syntax tweaks though and find ways of using the language that'll result in an easier learning experience. In particular there are two changes which will likely result in a much simpler on-ramp to learning.

*The nucleus of YouTube fame-seekers has migrated to Los Angeles. Hundreds of top-tier partners have left high-speed Internet connections in hometowns everywhere and settled here, on the periphery of the traditional entertainment industry. But for these viral stars, many of whom already pull in six figures a year from their channels, this move isn’t about getting their faces seen by studio heads or their voices heard by A&R reps. Instead, they come to work with one another. They room together, appear in one another’s videos, lend each other equipment and skills: camera work for special effects, say, or video editing for a song. Several have pooled resources to create mini networks, and an ancillary advertising business has materialized whereby YouTube luminaries are matched with companies scrambling to reach a young audience and build a presence online. (more)

Representative Ted Deutch introduced the "Outlawing Corporate Cash Undermining the Public Interest in our Elections and Democracy" (OCCUPIED) Constitutional Amendment on November 18, 2011. The OCCUPIED amendment would outlaw the use of for-profit corporation money in U.S. election campaigns and give Congress and states the authority to create a public campaign finance system. Labor Union-s and Non-Profit organizations will still be able to contribute to campaigns. On November 1, 2011, Senator Tom Udall also introduced a constitutional amendment in Congress to reform campaign finance which would allow Congress and state legislatures to establish public campaign finance. Two other constitutional campaign finance reform amendments were introduced in Congress in November, 2011. Similar amendments have been advanced by Dylan Ratigan, Karl Auerbach, Cenk Uygur, and others. (Occupy Wall Street, Campaign Finance) (more)

MIT platform for making its courses available online. (more)

Computer Game/MMORPG (more)

*American cable television network that offers coverage of federal government proceedings and other public affairs programming via its three television channels (C-SPAN, C-SPAN2 and C-SPAN3), one radio station and a group of websites that provide streaming media and archives of C-SPAN programs. C-SPAN's television channels are available to over 100 million cable and satellite households within the United States, while WCSP-FM, also called C-SPAN Radio, is broadcast on FM radio in Washington, D.C., and is available throughout the U.S. on XM Satellite Radio, via Internet streaming, by calling 202.626.8888, and through an iPhone app. (more)

How ironic to discover that MIT used Off Shoring for its Open Course Ware development. (more)

NPR voters have chosen 4 Constitutional Amendment-s. As of Dec. 20, you've chosen to abolish the Electoral College, to limit campaign contributions from corporations (Campaign Finance), to deny corporations the rights of citizens (Corporate Personhood) and to prohibit members of Congress from Lobbying once they leave office... But Christopher Phillips, who has traveled the country sparking discussions about rewriting the Constitution for his book Constitution Cafe, sees loopholes in many of readers' proposed amendments.

Stanford University Computer Science professor (more)

process of kicking off creation/passing of a Constitutional Amendment (more)

author (more)

Open Source Hardware for Desktop Fab. (more)

see World Of Warcraft

Carl Malamud is making/posting Video archives of the streams from the US Congress. Will Brian Lamb's CSPAN try to stop him?

Christopher Phillips has a new Constitution Cafe book (ISBN:0393064808) out. What if, in order to really appreciate what a democratic Constitution is all about, and how it can make or break a democracy over the long haul, we have to take part in the process of 'constitution creation'? What if we engaged in a 'constitutional thought experiment'? What if we held a 'new' Constitutional Convention of sorts, and acted as if we were the Framers? Using existing constitutional articles as the starting point, would we come to a more profound understanding of and appreciation for the amazing document created by our Framers -- even or especially if we decided to redo the articles? Would we be able to practice imaginative reasonableness, careful listening and equal recognition as we scrutinize a wide variety of proposals, inviting compelling objections and alternatives? Would we be able to reach creative compromise and consensus or even achieve a higher ground?