Internet tools to shake up a broken political system
The internet is bringing democracy to industry after industry.
Why can't it bring democracy to the greatest democracy of all?
Why can't it bring democracy to the greatest democracy of all?
Who We Are
Jim Gilliam and Jesse Haff are the team behind Act.ly, the simple, powerful, and much loved free Twitter petition tool used by everyone from moms to senators to rappers.
ditching their smiley mascot, replacing their logo, and changing their tagline. They built the technology to distribute DVDs online and through over 7,000 grassroots screening in its first week of release. In the process, they pioneered a new model for documentaries, Brave New Theaters, allowing filmmakers to bypass traditional movie distributors.
They turned film financing on its head with Iraq for Sale, the first film to ever raise a substantial portion of its funds from small donations online — $260,000 from over 3,000 donors.
In 2004, they teamed up to run the online operations for Robert Greenwald's documentary, Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price. They created Evil Smiley, "arguably one of the best logos since Ghostbusters", forcing Wal-Mart to completely change its corporate branding,
Jim Gilliam
Jesse Haff
A string of viral successes followed from Fox News Porn, which inspired a digg revolt, to the mega-hit The Real McCain, and the $3 Trillion Shopping Spree. After the 2008 election, Jim formed 3dna to explore how the internet could fix a broken political system. He built White House 2, the open source NationBuilder, GovLuv and Tweet Progress. Jesse joined in early 2010, and they are working on pro.act.ly, a web-based platform to elect the next generation of leaders in a radical new way.
Jim Gilliam
co-founded Robert Greenwald's Brave New Films, building a non-profit grassroots media powerhouse of a million members. In the late 90's, he launched Business.com as its Chief Technology Officer, and worked at Lycos, one of the first internet search engines. Gilliam produced four documentaries, and was honored in 2008 with Take Back America’s second annual Maria Leavey Tribute Award. His work has been featured in publications like the New York Times, Forbes, Wired, and the Washington Post. Jim fought cancer twice, and is the enormously grateful recipient of a bone marrow transplant and a double lung transplant.
Learn more about Jim.
email: - twitter: @jgilliam
Jesse Haff designed some of the most memorable and successful online activist websites including Sick for Profit, Michael Moore's Slacker Uprising, Fox News Porn, and Robert Greenwald's Brave New Films. When Jesse isn't designing the hot new internet tool, he's literally a rock star. Daylight Dies has released three critically acclaimed albums dubbed "masterful", "breathtaking" and "simply phenomenal work" by the music press. And he runs the online operations for some of the top Scandinavian metal bands. Learn more about Jesse.
email: - twitter: @slowdive
Selected Press
September 8, 2009 -- But according to new-media specialists, most of the liberal action on Twitter isn't coming from the Democratic Party. Instead, it’s coming from grassroots organizers who are building a base of like-minded activists. Jim Gilliam, a Los Angeles-based Web developer, says that unlike conservatives, progressives see Twitter “more as a way to connect people with each other.” He helped found TweetProgress.us, a directory of progressive Twitter users, and is currently working on GovLuv.org, a nonpartisan governmental directory scheduled to debut in September. He and his progressive colleagues use Twitter to collate support from the bottom up, rather than send messages from the top down.
September 30, 2009 -- What act.ly makes possible, says Jim, is for anyone to pounce on an opportunity, no matter how small, without the run-up and vetting and committee meetings that traditional advocacy groups might have to churn through before they act... Read on.
March 24, 2009 -- A site called White House 2-- created in late October, before Obama won -- doesn't just invite comments and questions but brings public participation on a mock WhiteHouse.gov to another level... Read on.
July 21, 2009 -- Act.ly is one of the slickest Twitter petition sites available... Read on.
February 16, 2010 -- Act.ly brings a whole new spin to online activism. Online petitions and e-mail advocacy have been around for almost a decade, and now there is a new tool to add to your nonprofit’s arsenal – Tweet-based Petitions... Read on.
