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"Our democracy has been hacked," Al Gore said to a group of entrepreneurs, journalists and techies at the South by Southwest Interactive Conference in Austin Monday. "It no longer works to serve the best interest of this country."
The former vice president and environmental activist joined Sean Parker, the founder of Napster and founding president of Facebook, in a conversation about how technology can change politics. Gore began the discussion with a call for an "Occupy Democracy" movement, launching a flurry of tweets with the hashtag #OccupyDemocracy.
The influence of money in politics has grown to the point that money has become a proxy for a vote, Gore said. The Internet, with its low barriers to entry, offers a space to change that. The online rally against the Stop Online Piracy Act was an example of people using social media to bring attention to and affect the issue, he said.
New digital tools let people take abstract ideas and turn them into platforms so they can make the system work, said Parker, whose startups -- Causes, NationBuilder and Votizen -- seek to organize political action. "The change we want to see is not going to come from inside politics,” he said. To which Gore replied: "I can confirm that."
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