I was on site for Joe Trippi's keynote to the Digital Democracy Teach-In portion of the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference yesterday. Reporters at the event included the San Jose Mercury News' Dan Gillmor, Toronto's The Globe and Mail, and Noah Schactman from Wired Magazine (hmmmm...did I really say that? I know I meant it; thanks NS), plus several other bloggers.

Later on yesterday a small consortium of volunteer technologists associated with the grassroots of several Democratic campaigns started the conversation I'd anticipated: how do projects like DeanSpace, Clark Community, et al. take their next steps in developing movement / campaign / emergent project cycles toward a further re-invigorated democratic process. It was a good first share....

(to be continued)

This mornings dazy hazy revelation: that presidential politics is very similar to a yacht race....

- it takes a LOT of money, often a syndicate, to make an initial go of it based simply on the infrastructure needs
- with the money, you need world-class expertise to develop high performance tools: hulls, sails, etc.
- with the money, you need a world-class skipper and crew

....but despite all this...

- one tack, one start, can often win a day's race and subsequently the cup
- the weather, the environment, the wind, sometimes contrary to the typical, can often decide the cup

The Dean campaign has showed the way for all Democrats to tack in prepration for racing with George Bush...
The Dean campaign has showed how to match a syndicate in money...
The Dean campaign has showed that the media weather can influence an election...
The Dean campaign has showed that the electorate weather is often local and subject to change...

As I sit in the lobby of the Westin in downtown San Diego, eagerly awaiting tomorrow's chance to meet many of the Dean technology folks, including Joe Trippi himself, I'm a firm believer that there are great days ahead....

Governor Dean started a wave that all Democrats are riding right now...and only one gets to be the Big Kahuna, riding the pipe toward Boston this summer.

There are lessons to mull over, progress to be planned and new ideas to push. Call it rose-colored glasses, but I truly think that Candidate 1.0 will be much better than the Beta...