Andrew Rasiej, the Founder and Publisher of the Personal Democracy Forum, will be joining us at the Symposium for Social Architecture on Nov 15th at Harvard. Andrew's activities most recently were in the spotlight as a result of his candidacy for Public Advocate of New York City, running in the Democratic primary. Although his bid for that post was unsuccessful, his platform -- which included elements such as municipal wifi -- drew a great deal of attention on a national level. Many writers, including Tom Friedman and me, saw something significant in his orientation to the issues he brought into the debate. Andrew will be participating in our session called "Katrina and Recovery 2.0: A Case Study in Web-based Civics".

Andrew has been deeply involved in the application of technology to politics, and has served as an advisor to Senators and Congressman and political candidates on the use of Information Technology for campaign and policy purposes since 1999. In 2001, he addressed the United States Senate Democratic Caucus in the Capital Building on the "Digital Divides Facing Democratic Party" and has been actively involved in the campaigns of many Senators and Congressmen. For the 2004 Presidential race he served as Chairman of the Howard Dean Technology Advisory Council. An accomplished entrepreneur and media figure, Andrew will be a great addition to our Symposium.

Jeff Jarvis, who was hoping to attend the Symposium, and who has played an invaluable role in its formation, has a insurmountable conflict, and will not be with us at Harvard, alas. But with Andrew and Chris Nolan (and others in the works) the Web-based Civics session is going to be very interesting, nonetheless.