April 17, 2008 - The 3rd annual TechSoup NetSquared Conference continues in the tradition of “remixing the Web for social change." This year’s event focuses on mashups and how this technology is driving a wave of opportunities (and challenges) for nonprofit organizations to leverage the sea of information on the Web to create change.
Mapping Money and Politics, a research project developed by MAPLight.org's research team, "depicts the geographic flow of campaign cash, providing citizens with new insights into how our campaign finance system affects the issues they care about," said Sean Tanner, MAPLight.org's Research Manager. "For example, with a click of a mouse, residents of New York City would be able to see how much money their representatives took from Texas oil companies in the months leading up to a key energy Vote in Congress," said Tanner.
Who owns your Congressperson? -- Local or National, Public or Special Interests.
Click on map to view Video Demo
"Patterns of money and politics will be revealed in ways never before possible," said Daniel Newman, Executive Director of MAPLight.org. "Our maps would allow people to assimilate data in the blink of an eye, bringing a new level of transparency to money and politics."
The research project combines money and vote data on interactive maps. The customized data mashup would use data from the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP) and the National Institute on Money in State Politics (NIMSP), and allow users to view contribution and voting data at a detailed level. The functionality would enable a user to zoom in from a national level all the way down to the community or district level.
NetSquared Mashup Project Challenge contest will award $100,000 in prize money to the top 21 projects at the TechSoup NetSquared Conference (N2Y3) sponsored by Cisco on May 27th and May 28th, 2008.
MAPLight.org's $25,000 first prize win at the NetSquared Innovation awards last year helped to fund MAPLight's Presidential Money Race Widget, a staple presidential fund raising measurement tool located on many sites across the Web including Huffington Post Fund Race.