Grassroots Worm

So, we have an election. An election means leaders debates, and leaders debates means the triennial controversy over "the worm". TV channels love it as a nifty little gimmock which gives their talking heads something to discuss afterwards, while politicians hate it as allowing them to be "unfairly" judged by the public (which is what elections are all about). The argument will go round and round, but there'll be one group left out of it entirely: us. You know, the voters who actually get to decide this thing. We disagree as well, of course, but the fact remains that some voters like the worm. And there's no reason why they shouldn't be able to have one - without affecting those who don't want to have a bar of it.

All the worm is is a plot of the average of a hundred or so dials, which the audiance wiggles between "low" and "high" depending on whether they like what is being said. It would be trivial to replicate the user end of this with a Java applet which tracks the mouse position from a central point. The applet could send its data to a server, which could combine the various inputs and present it as a running chart. In other words, people could tune in to a website during the debates (or interviews, for that matter) and register their opinion (in a crude "approval / disapproval" sense) while seeing that of others. And in true net fashion, those who don't like the worm don't have to see it.

My Java skills are somewhat limited, and I lack the server or resources to do this properly. I'm not even sure if I like the worm myself. But if someone else does, or simply enjoys making politicians uncomfortable, then feel free to take this idea and run with it.