The Pirate Party exists across 6 continents and in approximately 61 countries throughout the world (including the United States, Canada, Mexico, Australia, Japan, China, India, Russia, Israel, Switzerland, Germany, France, Spain, Morocco, Brazil, Argentina, and the United Kingdom). The European Pirate Party is also active within the European Union. Generally, the Pirate Parties support civil rights, direct democracy and participation in government, reform of copyright and patent law, free sharing of knowledge (open content), information privacy, transparency, freedom of information, anti-corruption and network neutrality.

Members of the Pirate Party of Norway originally heard about Follow My Vote and our revolutionary online voting system during the 1st European Liquid Democracy Meetup, which was hosted by Julia Reda (Pirate Party Member of the European Parliament). From there, the party as a whole wanted a chance to learn more about our online voting platform and its benefits first-hand. Needless to say, we took full advantage of this opportunity!

This meeting, which is held annually in Oslo, Norway, took place on March 21-22. Ernest, was originally invited to speak for approximately 45 minutes; however, due to the active engagement and participation from the audience, his presentation lasted nearly 90 minutes. A shortened version of his presentation can be viewed below:

During the presentation, Ernest shared his experience with voting in his first election (the 2000 U.S. Presidential Election). He also mentioned the controversy surrounding this particular election and the fallout that followed. Ernest then discussed how utilizing a verifiable voting system could restore faith in the democratic process, once and for all. He also demonstrated Follow My Vote’s proof of concept verifiable online voting application.

We took a several pictures during the presentation, which can be seen in the image gallery below:

Being that the Pirate Party of Norway was established recently, several members of the Pirate Party were fascinated with the idea of using our online voting system as a way to build a more specific platform for their faction of the party. Using our verifiable online voting platform, the Pirate Party will have the ability to establish consensus with respect to the issues that matter most to the party, determine where the party stands on such issues, and decide how best to prioritize addressing these issues as a party. If anything, the Pirate Party of Norway intends on using Follow My Vote’s online voting system in their political party’s internal elections.

The Pirate Party of Norway aims to serve as an example to the rest of the world by embracing cutting-edge technology in order to provide transparency into the political process. To this end, they have requested to be the first political party to begin utilizing the platform, as soon as Follow My Vote (in partnership with BitShares) has completed development of the commercially viable version of their software.

In the days ahead, we intend to work with the Pirate Party of Norway to ensure that we develop an open-source version of our software that meets their party’s needs, as well as reach out to the Pirate Party in various countries across the globe to gather their requirements to ensure our voting platform is fit for worldwide adoption.

NOTE: Follow My Vote is a non-partisan organization. Although we will be developing a verifiable online voting system that will assuredly meet the needs of the Pirate Party, this announcement and/or plan of action should in no way shape or form serve as an endorsement for the Pirate Party by Follow My Vote. 

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