FreedomSpeaks Official Blog

Transforming Civic Engagement

Archive for July, 2008

Our API is Coming Soon!

Jul 24

Posted by FreedomSpeaks in FreedomSpeaks, Politics

I just wanted to give everyone a quick heads up. I have some exciting news about Freedom Speaks. I’ll be launching our API very soon! The API will have some barebones features to start, but I hope to make almost all the data on our site available through the API. Here are a couple of the features we’ll be launching with:

  1. Who Represents You?
    (Enter: Your Address; Get: Your Districts + Officials)
  2. Forward A Letter…
    (Enter: Any LetterId + Address; Get: Your Districts + Officials + Your Letter Sent)
  3. Get A Letter
    (Enter: Any LetterId; Get: Letter + Comments)
  4. Get An Official
    (Enter: Any OfficialId; Get Official + Comments)
  5. Search Officials
    (Enter: Search Terms; Get Officials)

The results sets will be pretty verbose and returned as Xml. You’ll be able to pick and choose what data you’d like to display within your application.

We’re also making available a few widgets that consume our API services. Embed any one of these widgets on your own profile, and you’ll instantly enable your visitors to take action on any issue you’d like! That’s pretty powerful stuff.

Stay Tuned!

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Perhaps I should be a professional interviewee?

Jul 17

Posted by FreedomSpeaks in Web / Tech

I came across an interesting startup today. It’s called NotchUp, and apparently you can now get paid to go on job interviews. I haven’t signed up, but I calculated my interview price with their free calculator, and it came to $690 / interview. Not too shabby.

TwiistUp 4 is later tonight, and I’m going to be there. There will be a few showoffs putting their wares to market. It should prove to be an interesting night. I applied to be a showoff with FS, but my application was denied! I think my website/product is pretty compelling, but then, of course, I’m a bit biased. I’ve got the framework for my API up and running. Feel free to check it out. It’s buggy, of course, but that should change as time goes on. If you’re going to be at the TwiistUp event tonight, be sure and say hello if you see me.

Below’s a list of some interesting letters I’ve noticed come through on FS. Enjoy!

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Senator Larry Craig now has some internet friends!

Jul 8

Posted by FreedomSpeaks in Current Affairs, FreedomSpeaks, Politics

An interesting event happened last night around 6 PM. I saw an unusual amount of activity on FREEDOMSPEAKS.COM and thought I may have a potential spammer on my hands. I was pleasantly surprised to find that not only was it not a spammer, buy my site had become the target of a quite intriguing blog post by WONKETTE.COM. The story poked fun at the Senator, making light of the fact that he didn’t have any friends on my site. If you follow the comments on WONKETTE.COM, I think you’ll find (as I did) the comments are pretty amusing. Some might say that it isn’t right that we add fodder to the fire of a political scandal, but politicians are fair game in my books. More often than not, they tout themselves as pillars of society. We all know that that couldn’t be farther from the truth.

So, I’d like to give a shout out to the WONKETTE.COM. One final thought. Now that Senator Larry Craig has over 20 friends, what do we do about Senators Obama, Clinton and McCain? They don’t even come close! Maybe Senator Craig should be running for president.

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