)
Loomio co-founder Alanna Krause says the idea came about following a meeting between the Occupy movement and Enspiral, a social enterprise tech hub in Wellington.
"We realised that, while a movement and a business are quite different, actually we shared a common problem: how to make timely, effective decisions that include everyone affected. We saw that by moving the process online, we could facilitate groups to get better information, consider diverse perspectives by including more kinds of people, and ultimately come up with better outcomes together."
Since being made public nearly a year ago, Krause says at least 5,000 groups have signed up to the Beta prototype.
In New Zealand, the Loomio prototype has been used by groups such as Generation Zero, a youth-led network of climate change activists, community-based mental health service providers Pathways, and even the Wellington City Council, who used Loomio to run public consultation on its alcohol management strategy.
Loomio has also been used internationally, including by the Wikimedia Foundation (who is behind Wikipedia) and the London School of Economics, and has been translated into 17 languages. Loomio users have also started translating the software into Ukrainian, in response to requests from activists there.
"Loomio is for anyone tired of trying to get everyone in the same place at the same time for meetings, and sick of long, messy "reply-all" email threads that never come to a clear conclusion," Krause says.
"Loomio is for people who want to stop talking endlessly in an unfocused way on social media, and instead take collective action to solve real problems. Loomio is for anyone who wants to live in a more inclusive, democratic society where including all voices means we all benefit from better outcomes together."
On Tuesday, Loomio launched a global crowdfunding campaign, aiming to raise at least US$100,000 so developers can create Loomio 1.0.
"Loomio 1.0 is all about making a truly inclusive tool, because real democracy has to include everyone," Krause says.
"This means it has to be mobile and work across all kinds of devices, opening it up to situations and parts of the world where computers aren't available. It will be easy to host your own instance on your own server, so people with high security concerns can take complete control of their data and privacy.
"It will be accessible, and work great with assistive technologies like screen readers. And most importantly, Loomio 1.0 will be easy to use and intuitive, meaning anyone can participate simply and easily in decisions that affect them."
Already more than US$20,000 has been raised from about 300 donors.
As long as the support keeps coming, Krause says Loomio 1.0 is on target to be released in November.
Over 300 contributors now - wow! So grateful for everyone's support. #crowdfunding http://t.co/Q4HqaCwop4
Now I just need something to help me choose what to have for lunch.
We don't like Mondays. Or Sundays in December.
Twitter analysed the use of words and phrases in tweets last year by the day of the week and month and found some expected and surprising results. People are more likely to tweet that they are "feeling sad" on a Sunday in December or a Monday in October, while "hungover" surprisingly is most often used on Tuesdays in January as well as Thursdays and Fridays in November.
Which day of the week are you most likely to Tweet that you are "hungover"?
https://t.co/Euxg78ydp8 pic.twitter.com/cwA9LmAE0D
Which day of the week are you most likely to Tweet that you're late for work?
https://t.co/Euxg78ydp8 pic.twitter.com/kvn6a0tWDy
Check out more from the study
here
.
Tweets of the week
Politics have dominated my Twitter stream this week. So here are some tweets about flags, scandals and something happening on September 20
Cunliffe should show some REAL leadership and call the election before Key.
Ughh even NZ corruption revolves around milk...
They've put the red carpet down for Judith Collins' backdown. That's how rare they are. pic.twitter.com/JWxeSJPxli
Lets see if labour and the greens can manage not to knock the Adams/Collins story from prime position between now and 6pm.
So now Australia is thinking of changing their flag? It better not end up being similar to our new one or every Kiwi will be PISSED.
Don't know why critics say not enough time to combine flag referendum with election. Putin's running vote in Crimea on annexation next week!
Surely by the time the flag actually changes they'll be able to print animated GIFs on fabric?
So is this election a referendum on whether we should have referendum on changing the flag?
All these people tweeting about the flag debate being a distraction from the real issues, you get you're already being distracted, right?
Two internet memes in one: The Tinderpface. pic.twitter.com/pO6V2cnvCJ
If you've seen any great Kiwi Tumblr, Instagram, Facebook, Vine, Twitter, Youtube or Pinterest accounts that deserve wider attention, or you're involved in an online project or campaign that deserves a plug, let me know me. Suggestions are also welcome. I'm on Twitter here, Instagram here and Vine here. You can also email me here. Send abuse here.
