If you don’t know what Snapchat is don’t worry. It is a fairly new smartphone app that lets users send messages and images to one another. The unique part is that the message gets deleted after being viewed.

One feature that has been added to Snapchat is called “stories”. You can choose to send a message to one friend or you can opt to make the message your story. This means all of your friends will be able to view this message for the next 24 hours.

Recently, Snapchat has been producing stories of their own called “Our Stories”.  These are essentially a culmination of pictures and videos from all the people at one event. Users of the app submit their picture or video to the event story. The event could be a holiday, concert or even a snowstorm. The Snowmageddon snow storm of 2015 story reportedly got 27 million views on the app.

We were extremely exited to see a Snapchat election story for the UK election. Hundreds of people had submitted photos and videos of their voting experiences. Young voters got to share their first voting experience with the world, while others simply encouraged people to get out and vote. Either way this was an awesome use of technology to support democracy.

We also really liked the fact that the app stayed non-partisan. There was only one story topic and the submitted media was from voters. There were no advertisements or stories dedicated to a certain party. Below is one of the pictures we managed to snag from the Snapchat election story.

The post Snapchat Election Story In The UK appeared first on Follow My Vote.

Regardless if it does or not, here are 7 ways “We the People” could be affected by a government shutdown:

1. Taxes
   • Naturally, we would still have to pay our taxes.
2. Mail
   • Depending on how long the shutdown lasts, we may stop receiving our mail.
3. Loans
   • That house that some of us have been saving up for, if we were planning on applying for a government-backed mortgage to make it happen, we’ll have to put those plans on hold.
4. Guns
   • If any of us were thinking about getting a license and becoming a gun owner, we’d best get our twiddling thumbs ready because we’re going to be waiting a long time.
5. Jobs
   • Most of us that are federal government employees will be forced to take unpaid leave from our jobs. Others will be forced to work on federal IOU’s until a new funding bill can be drafted, approved, and signed by the President.
6. Tourism
   • Our national parks, museums, and monuments will shut their doors to the public, which will prevent our government from generating the money it needs to keep the lights on.
7. Social Security
   • New memberships for this and other entitlement programs, such as Medicare, will be put on hold.

Believe it or not, our government has been through a shutdown before; the United States federal government shutdown of 1995 and 1996 happened during Bill Clinton’s first term as President of the United States.

We survived as a nation, but our economy suffered, as it cost the government $3.7 billion. This time around, if we don’t demand a speedy resolution from our government, it could end up costing our government much more than before.

On the other hand, some of our elected officials in Washington D.C. argue that a government shutdown could actually save our government money, preventing government dollars from being wasted on unnecessary government programs.

We at Follow My Vote don’t have an opinion on this issue or any other political issue for that matter, as we are and will forever remain a nonpartisan organization. However, we do think it’s high time that “We the People” decide on which government programs should be considered necessary or unnecessary.

One thing we do know for sure is that we will always have a need for some level of government in the United States and abroad in order to keep the peace, which is why we’re here.

If you want to be considered part of “We the People” please register for our site and join us in our quest to ensure our elected officials in Washington D.C. stop playing political games and start working for us!

The post What will happen if a government shutdown occurs? appeared first on Follow My Vote.