Valentin Chaput about Open Source Politics. A decade of digital tools & the next generation

so why come on in these episodes

of democracy in way in the weekly

podcast the and today we are here

we for valentine shabu from open source

politics and the why come to this

podcast and a and they would like

to ask you as as a

first question i yeah what is open

source politics

yeah so what does a pencil spectacle

that's a pretty sixties and is a

combat at we belong in the social

economy sixth or but yet we are

a company almost nine years old

at we are based in paris with

house and and as the name says

we are trying to bring open-source to

the political sphere and and impact the

political

debates with a pencil software so we

can provide open source tools at to

read and the battery democracy processes and

at we especially to use a desert

him which is one of the the

software us and obviously we have to

all multiple marriages and also and

consulting and methodologies to in order to

to succeed in in those processes but

yeah basically at the very beginning it's

using open source tools though political discussions

and decision okay so nine years it's

quite a long time especially and his

field and i would like to ask

you how did he change like have

you felt any any changes in time

yeah i think so there are different

the obvious the and

ways to answer this question what i

can say is that almost ten years

ago

in cross and was seem quite typically

french at the moment at that moment

we are a lot of projects the

thought the way it using subic technologies

and we had a lot of hope

that twitter to really bring a big

changes

and it's it was not the only

place of just leave spain it was

a advanced the we had connection with

taiwan or was latin america with greece

and all in all those countries and

political backgrounds there were

a desire to use a new tools

in order to do pretty political action

a bit different kid so that was

really ten years ago

a lot of enthusiasm and a lot

of volunteering and and and or of

projects that were just starting at bootstrapping

and and then we add another failure

the where and especially for us in

closet it was after the two thousand

and seventeen a leg

russian president direction and what was before

just to let's say at movement air

became

it's our business or markets and and

most of the the people including us

at were advocating for those new tours

and new politics and became a company's

became and civil servant with responsibilities on

the field

so we already at the more

yeah professionalism and using those tools as

we became very concrete and and i

would say that for the past

three five years and we are in

a second

your the where are we have had

the innovations we we made all the

first pilots and and pioneering with a

few projects and and now we are

running a lot of them replicating indifferent

spheres and also we are starting chores

will criticize somehow what has been done

what could be done differently

and and at the moment especially in

france but they said i think in

in all southern europe and we have

a trend that is slowly decreasing artists

are discussing the real impacts of those

tools and i think that too

trance two options one is to consider

that and it's open it opens a

new direction it's that we need new

tools new technologies especially using ai and

because obviously it will have an impact

on those are typically riches so there

this

it's a socialistic vision and and and

then there is also another trend that

is can we need to to go

deeper with the processes to make them

maybe do a little less but make

sure that they have an impact make

sure that they are really really

events die involving people are and in

at the end the bring real change

and not chester new tools new innovation

in a lot of communication so those

to transfer interesting and actually we are

trying to explore both are at the

pencil six

because of leave from the very beginning

we are saying that the tools almost

magical the bring a lot but the

magical and we have to make sure

that to really useful

yeah of course of developing at all

is not enough for the rest of

your an adoption and really exists and

so it seems to me that if

i understood correctly that there was an

increase in the the little fears about

the developing tools yeah and the

i think there was maybe also some

more interest the from the institutions

of the this kind of tools and

the so open source politics works mainly

in french

in and the or not

mostly in for us in terms of

number of contracts but are we also

walk at the european level we were

krista european commission of europe and projects

a few european cities as well in

other countries and member states and also

we have at some projects

it's outside of europe especially were walking

with the city of new york in

the u s

because they also used to sit him

the the mostly obviously it's in france

and what it was in europe now

okay and as he feared the

to go deeper in in the processor

in the researchers

the to trends one could be building

new to sir especially wi fi and

other to understand more the processes

that made the tools work

i wonder like on the political side

the like a institutions politicians are aware

of beer potentiality of of technology and

like yeah so obviously as a saw

i saw those two trans but they

think they are complementary like we we

we need to always improve the tools

and also reflect on how to use

their

i i would say that do some

public institution and some politicians are well

aware of

the the potential impact the the needs

to use those tools but also do

the interests of the looking open source

technologies and to be of rain with

the tools that we use especially in

europe and it's vault of the news

those days with the water

appends in the u s was older

the big thick and so for that

there is a yeah political concern probably

some people are really reflecting and on

that

i would say also that there is

a trend that we see

that some of the politicians all decision

makers or institutions are considering that the

tools they are proposing new ways to

interact the damage that revolutionary and somehow

i doubt and sometimes the cannot

completely follow the trend and and and

always use them and we see that

some

territories are somehow going back at like

reversing what was done mostly for political

power from the financial reasons like didn't

look have the budget to continue or

it's not considered as a priority in

this world where we have a lot

of

what or concerns

so it's it's very a mixed and

sir i would say on my side

bets for sure there is also

of progress that was made in advocating

open source technologies in promoting acidic technologies

of the past ten years crusher

okay and thinking about new tools

but also about the tools that are

used to right now so audacity me

the think it's it could be for

maybe the core yeah

but the are there are other tools

that the are very use the

by institutions right now

yeah yeah so

the city it's interesting to just to

tell the story once again

in spain two thousand and eleven

among all the occupy movement so around

the world they were the the can

submit your in in in spain so

yeah those as we also said and

political demonstrations a new generation asking for

a new innovation new ways to do

the

so to interact with the institutions new

wasted the politics of for your list

for years later and citizen conditions of

on the largest cities in in spain

madrid and in job i sorta nine

cornea and in the dame

this new generation started to create new

tubes and one of them was created

in marines it was console it's all

stages and and his team was created

by the city of barcelona because they

didn't agree with a madrid on the

roadmap for the to

the city was created from the very

beginning as very modular article so as

you say it's a car

engine and then you you can play

the matures and from the very beginning

it it leads a lot of freedom

to the administrators to create processes to

assign roles to use different features and

at our surveys and i degeneration even

talk

musician

participatory budgeting voting phase petitions

collaborative writing and blogging even so it's

authority did did they wanted to create

kind of an alternative and political social

network at the local level and and

that was a disodium is is a

is generic it it'll feel a lot

of possible configurations and and it's really

the kind of is the main website

an institution that will want to to

open about cemetery battery democracy or use

digital democrats are obviously it as sort

of competitors the can do almost the

same data in the same array of

providing different tools within the same bottom

so but i think on this field

of generic tools the is probably the

best in the way that is the

most ethical

it is run by an association it

is a one hundred percent open-source it

is very interesting and in the components

suspect also between we probably come back

to that later and and then the

other tools that are more maybe specialized

in what interaction

so for example there is a to

let exist for almost ten years also

that is quite famous it's police pulled

that is and this is a it

was an advance and the trend of

ai and from the very beginning it's

a

asking users to answer some some

some questions artist to the ticket to

make a stance on on different them

questions and and it designs a map

of the controversies like it for groups

people who have the same interests of

the same answers and it can very

efficiently

sure you if to a debate is

controversial or are and what are the

two or three groups that can be

identified when talking about something or it

was used for is putting taiwan almost

ten years ago

in a debate on on the use

of from you bear and odor kind

of from

the services the though the same like

a car sharing

it was quite new for them so

they they use the tool and it

was one of the best use case

priority for that it has been used

and more recently we have seen and

order tools like are the ones from

another french company that does make the

toward at which is one of our

partners or endeavor to let

is very efficient to it's quite simple

in the sense of it is limited

to and shot proposals smith by users

and then voting

on those and really fast analytics and

and with the idea to reach a

lot of and participants and and then

also identify controversies all more supported proposals

and and are bringing more a

the into the into the tools as

well as to explain and

and describe all the aspects of a

political debate so those are more specified

like a specialized tools and i think

it's the the train we have we

seen boss happening so very large and

generic and and very useful bottles

the shooting being promoted the the best

possible option

and and then more specialized tools with

one direction that they're really do well

and we can connect the photo was

obviously now

okay thank you very interesting

maybe we go back to tooth later

i wanted to ask you again about

open source politics like and how did

it happen

because i read now st louis i'm

very niche like not a lot of

people are in these the field data

that can imagine that ten years ago

it was seven

but what is surprising

and maybe it's an issue it's that

people that were the thought here today

were already there ten years ago at

least in france and and in mostly

if for consider if we look at

are also other countries like this again

to see dim it was created eight

years ago at on

nine years ago so it's really happening

it was happening at the same time

and and the woolwich very different it

was before the first mandate of original

tribes was before brexit i just before

cambridge analytica it was really the time

when we consider that

the digital edition was the only solution

of the ventilation and we were very

again optimistic about

about it

twitter was very different obviously and so

and yeah ten years ago

i if i bring my own story

i was already walking in the political

field in the local institution and then

in the french parliament was advising decision

makers and the

i felt that there was a divide

between the population in the the the

decision making process and obviously the politicians

so i was not obviously the only

one to see that spitzer i decided

to

yeah to try something else and i

followed a bootcamp to learn the basics

of cutting

as it was exactly ten years ago

and and the in this or bootcamp

i drafted the prototype

of a tool that never existed but

a tool that could help

citizens understand the process of writing the

law the new law and and the

we wanted it to be open source

and after this boot camp i

met with the other people who were

interested in the field or embarrass the

were already quite a few of them

and and among them are i met

my future of on us at first

we are published a few should texts

we organize the show a workshop

https and hackathons add to improve the

the genius thing tools and and one

of the the events that we did

she organized i was a

away through the draft or to to

create a neutral the for a city

near paris and from there we received

requests to

provide additional tools to other

territories and we decided to creates the

combined with from the very beginning we

really at this

commitments to open source will reconsider it

was very important

in general but especially when we are

talking about

political technologies are

obviously digital democracy and it hasn't impact

on decision making and and we were

also a very attracted by what was

are being created the outside of for

our country and its there with as

we met people from taiwan in mexico

and and in in especially in spain

and in barcelona so the story of

the city in an open-source politics is

really are closely related because we will

one of the first partners of the

city him outside of of catalonia and

and and he was really

the true this a deal that we

were able to grow as a company

as a and also

consultants looking at how we can use

those digital tools

felt his face it is participation so

yeah the story was that and and

from there i come

obviously we had one or two first

years of exploration and after that it

was a general increase

of the time it's interesting that you

do not came from computer science so

if you can see maybe towards about

your background because i think it's yet

interesting so one of the the key

ingredients in the recipe for just what

it takes is that we were for

co-founders

coming from different backgrounds but sharing the

same interest so on my side i

came from a political science so and

attended that and and really i was

and

an expert on and on previous knowledge

and experience in basically the jury are

were all clients were so the public

institutions and especially local ones

with my coffin this one of them

was more on the product side

of of online tools and one of

them are still has to offer princess

but it takes a was a developer

forum already almost ten years or so

yeah we had we had all the

expertise and combining our different backgrounds

are we are quite successful in the

first years because we were very complementary

and agreeing on the roadmap and and

it was too is quite to the

quite simple yet to to true really

understand

everything that was needed

on day decide and also the business

side

okay and there was like i dunno

if you remember la carte a moment

in your life when you realize the

that the

this union between politics and technology was

interesting for you

do program that were several but until

like

i was interested in in in digital

affairs but i was reading not understanding

anything

before i attended the camp and that

was the reason why i wanted to

to be more and of have no

more knowledge about it better i would

say probably

priority during the january the american presidential

election of barack obama there was a

lot of interest like social network with

were growing

he made it all his team has

made her of progress and in organizing

through the internet and i what i

was think i was more interested in

politics than a digital first and i

understood that it was a new way

to the basics so i think

that came it came from there but

also i was always interested in in

new technologies and you're trans

but relieve fall very long time i

was just the

not understanding anything about the computer science

and i still understand the prisoners sir

an alternate that the accused i understand

that it's a bit more and yeah

yeah so i think yeah with so

so in terms of her

age i was probably

twenties early twenties when i started really

hunting and interests for that

okay it's been interesting to see how

people a the yeah i think i

was also i was also blogging and

liking to read blogs so it really

was ten twenty years ago

the and blogging at the and at

a few impacts are in france we

had the this moments that twenty years

ago in two thousand and five where

we are the referendum on the european

treaties and twas the

like to do people rejected the treaty

and and and a lot of the

debates

as it been online true blogs and

and forums as a very whole school

but yeah that that produce interest also

came from that

bouquet now and and talking about the

maybe be going back to tulsa get

the that the

i mean they are an important part

because i mean

you from

depending how the tool is design than

also the people behavior in different way

because the citizen have to do something

instead of something else

and the thought how do

thinking about the new tools to do

you feel that something is needed

i mean we will say that the

now the recently i heard the probably

the we will see more integration we

fi in the future

but is there something like i dunno

tools should be more i dunno bottom

up or or something related to the

design that you think it's important to

yeah so i would say

the first what we are currently the

tools well designed mostly for by institutions

of for the the interest of institutions

so they are somehow quite top done

obviously some of them are made to

let image new ideas new proposals that

it's sir most of the time are

coming from the institution and sadhana completely

grass roots and citizen based

for that we have petitions would say

that's the main tool and the people

organize and

and and the other aspect is that

the tools are built for an age

of writing and reading and

the trend is that new generations tend

to speak and watched videos and and

reels and and chats formats and not

focus on on the text

and so the tourists are not completely

aligned with the basic habits of people

on on the internet

especially younger generations now so there is

any false to be made in all

the first to integrate more direct interaction

property for example letting people just the

recalled the voice when the sharon id

the and bring that eighty two the

system and

at the moment it's not completely done

but it's feasible technically and and also

pro like using

artificial intelligence capacities for an interesting propose

that would be helping people understand the

debates what is a steak because of

his head in the one reads the

thirty pages reports are that you should

read before taking part in the in

the process but he should have a

summary and you can

ask a few questions then you can

obviously be more informed you can propose

an eighty and and the be assisted

in the real formulation of decided in

order to make sure that to is

some of the same idea as someone

else as was just published all

it can all in the contrary or

create a bridge between different ids and

make sure that the we we cristo

those ideas and and we can enrich

them so for that and i think

that there is a need for mute

declarative new or another aspect is that

and and we are looking at it

and the moment wizard of partners be

to open it is removing that it's

or are we make sure that sir

those contributions are interoperable with other tourists

suffers from the just before i told

you that may be frightened better make

those org as a very powerful tool

to make people vote massively in favor

or against different problems but the a

degenerate

one is is more powerful the because

of and even kind of categories attachments

commands endorsements on proposals for example you

you could have first purpose of some

this idiom of then you and send

them to to make the target to

have a massive voting on them and

maybe the top twenty proposal

you can enrich them on this theme

and and quebec or so that's would

be the kind of interaction that we

want you to create the making sure

that are also when i dunno there

isn't debates in italy or on climate

change

there is also these debates in france

and maybe it's interesting to compare all

to even share the proposals

because obviously the seventy bits are happening

everywhere at the number of debates on

governance of ai at the moment everywhere

there is that seems to be one

that if we could just have a

larger space where we could share on

the the insights from those debates are

obviously the decision and the deliberation we'd

be more

the porphyry we also need a and

i think it's one of the interest

of for your own work the tools

for the liberation like to go bit

further in the process not just sharing

an id your command to vote but

really co-creating caucus co building

the

put his political and public places that

that would be necessary to also developed

may be new tunes that can again

and blend with weapons are physically in

workshops in public assemblies are citizen

finance and me so found that i

think yeah we we might need you

tools

and to lower the barrier but also

go very and

like really deeper in terms of from

understanding analysis of and and complexity of

yeah it seems to me like to

see two different trends in the tech

field

one is the more two's sort of

replicated the actual functioning office who shot

just in the digital space to make

it easier to vote in to will

receive feedbacks and the other one is

more like to experiment to to find

new ways for people to decide

i bought something and the and these

new ways of course have to be

tested the and all

or eventually of the that the by

institutions yeah and the that i see

this part as very interesting and the

yeah i think it was a very

the yeah yeah but i think it

was all else

the it was always the the debate

i on should we improve the current

the functioning of our institutions all somehow

generate new one song

all even yeah create nuance and and

consider the current ones on the talking

so i've just the and i think

the to again can evolve in the

huddle

and for the disodium it's a tool

designed by an institution for other institutions

and in some ways we when we

provide the tool to new institutions they

are just functioning as they are down

get more open maybe than ten years

ago

go

on some topics on some processes

but

prodi it's not revolutionary it's not changing

the rules enough as for the also

voices that the want to read bypass

the current institutions had some all generate

more citizen engagement creating projects using the

the power of the clergy and

and i think and what is interesting

ways open sources that are with the

same tool that the institution elk designing

and creating developing and we can have

all the types of movements that we

use the same to benefit from the

public investment and generates more engagement was

that

that's what we you could hope for

yeah

thank you

and thinking about the old

the people the threat now i dunno

how to cook them a digital activist

people interested in the civic tech

yeah

how do you think the they are

collaborating right now and is there space

to any kind of improvement to make

it more efficient to

yeah so i think what i have

seen is that most of all competitors

jodo companies that created tools

the created their own to so it's

difficult for them to go beyond the

tool and because he always wanted to

improve it

and and said he and and and

said it more and where's the city

we have a different approach we consider

that we have to be or collaborating

on the same tool and it's what

is also very interesting like we we

consider that for example

the order companies deploying service providing services

around the city him we we do

not consider them as competitors but as

as partners and and obviously sometimes they

will gain a contract that will not

have that

it's a it's more important that we

have this am

come on projects where we all

share our resources with contributes ready to

improve the demand for that disodium was

really a very interesting project because as

it is a digital democracy platform it

was used by the creators of the

city him in order to run the

project democratic

so there is now so it came

from this each of us with an

to for several years now it is

run by an independent to association and

ways a different type of partners some

of them all companies or those eyes

additions or there are more

and technical side the universities also researchers

and and and citizens that are really

interested in committing to the to the

common at the rear the project and

and the we have this process of

an open road map of the tool

anyone can share and is for new

features and i take you did soak

the the tool saw the their the

the options are then evaluated by a

professional to product team some of them

being then funded by public institutions

the and are different providers will share

the same some doubts in order to

add new features to to the platform

so that has been ready success maybe

it's not the tool that evolves the

fastest but it it is one of

the the richest in to

terms of take off from spaces features

combination that you can create and it's

also the one that is the the

most transparent like you can access all

the story of the tool online you

can really be part of it contributes

as so for that again

would say it's a to it's real

good inspiration for someone discovering civic tech

to who gets what the city has

done

and again in order to expand that

it's what we want to do is

interoperability saw it sir and really making

sure that we created turned out to

share content from one platform to the

other and we can imagine that and

five ten years no matter the to

let you use

years old data will share the same

protocol the same out and you would

be able to to as a user

as a citizen bring your own data

and that the and not a story

on the platform itself and and then

interact with people using different platforms probably

differ

is it different countries and all that

being here and also facilitated by a

machine translation

a i analysis

that would be that would be interesting

to see all we can add

move from everyone every institution having its

own platform every company developing its own

software to reveal a public space very

disturbed kids using different technologies or pencil

standouts

at the larger scale that that could

be interesting

yeah it's it's very exciting to think

about to all the technologies that are

being developed the i mean that were

developed and are being developed the and

we will be developed to to now

out all these the i would say

a sort of ecosystem where do i

dunno someone as a new media about

a new tool the just developed that

the small part that the then can

be a module of density the just

a standalone product with some way poi

that through the product can use

and then

i never liked us q if theresa

i dunno any any project that you

are excited about also a project that

you have seen on the internet the

the

i am so i bought from the

ones that we are already involved in

i

i don't know if they will be

projects really directly related to what we

want to talk about

and yeah i would say the project

so i considered a to speak the

courage it did damn testing when they

interact with the the the life cycle

of a public debate predict decision so

at first there is religious importance of

information and quite each of information and

it's something that as a it's read

the butter at the moment we have

seen a lot of

fake news spreading for the best in

you as a we we we see

with the ai the fake that now

it is

more simple if you have to the

defense and and knowledge to even disrupt

the political debates particular elections

and we already at risk was that

will get swept up in romania always

someone emerging in one months and a

lot of research is the content and

fake news and able to almost winner

president's election we see what happens in

germany at the moment with

on masker supporting the far right and

day they are raising the bots a

asleep so we see that the that

it's it's really important to have to

improve the quality of information and to

resist to all the attacks adequacy and

for that i the

new new tools that the probably are

being developed a the twill the also

helped pupil

i like detects when there is a

manipulation weather is a fake news and

we can of tomatoes that as that

that's interesting

and then we have tools to

so information than mobilization you are informed

you are into you want to act

on that field i think the are

very powerful tool that already exist to

organize campaigns fund raising so that i

would say it's over the almost covered

between obviously improve

it's a it's already exist and then

when you are mobilized new you you

have your debate in your in need

to make a decision you need a

bitter deliberation and i think the yet

among the different

the tools that are should exist and

the and vision then maybe developed already

there is this a

this wall and objective of and

recreating the

the advantages of face to face discretion

in order to bring deliberation the line

at a larger scale may be multilingual

may be

on very different difficult topics and for

that they are there are some new

technologies

it could be summarizing discussion with

real humans and online in order to

are held to yeah because it's it's

we always share more when we discuss

then when we write down a comment

and and we wait five hours before

there is a native or so it's

it's a

this recreation of her face to face

interaction in larger group or by letter

on a thanks to a synthesis made

by ai thanks to maybe translation as

well that's that's really interesting and important

korea to create that

and then so they are the fall

steps information mobilization decision slashed deliberation and

then i think what is important is

also evaluation and

sharing data sharing knowledge and thanks to

things to again on the open data

analysis we have neutrals new visualization

it's is simpler than ever to

i really are

understand what came from one thousand ids

the are written on the platform so

he had awesome tools that are very

interesting as wedding this field and i

think if we're gonna make it kind

of from a career and ecosystem of

different tools addressing all those parameters a

we will improve

the quantity of digital democracy obviously it's

a big challenge also because as you

said it says more niche or a

the on there is not a lot

of money and six or more yeah

and and are very powerful tools outside

of its that for do not swamps

to have a long and peaceful now

deliberation as so it's a it's a

big challenge but i think what are

some interesting stuff

and the do you have any method

for the people like active in the

field the or that would like to

do something about i dunno developing new

tools so

i can

yeah i said okay

i think and most importantly of and

tools

like its

as you said in a previous question

it's important to

considered at the core already exists we

already have tools are we already the

other networks are to discuss that

we have to be marjoram a bring

new modules new features new ideas new

people and and the and yeah that's

the way we will create a digital

common that is more powerful and and

so yeah the the the the suggestion

would be just to connect with people

already in the field share the ids

a try to

to the to proof of concepts of

what it could be and then make

sure that it is interoperable with what

the roads exists because a yeah we

need so much more the flophouse much

more designers as so much more political

leaders

re contributing to to bring these filled

to the next level

and so it's it's open away we

need more people

and real

and the good news is that the

bases already exist i think it's it's

quite solid it's quite stable and bitter

we have to to extend its yep

okay thank you

and then is there anything else that

you'd like to share that you think

it's worth it to

no i would say tincture father invitation

that discussion and it's interesting to see

that there is a new interests and

in in the san

for this projects in general and you

energy also from

yeah maybe new parts of europe

and

so yeah thank you for that could

look for this podcast

of this discuss the cast

i was reacting to to be thought

of it and then let's discuss again

further

and on how we can improve those

to cottages altogether

yeah absolutely thank you thank you

thank you

a