techno.blog("Dion")

I met Andrew Mason of the new website, The Point, which is a Rails based application that is trying to bring the people together to make a difference. When people organize in huge numbers, they can change the world, and this site enables you to do that, or something much smaller.

I just saw that Mashable had a chat with Andrew, so I thought I should post a little walk through that I did of the site.

I think they did a great job at creating a simple to use experience, and it has Ajax in all of the right places, and not in your face. You see the usual suspects such as a nice and simple signup system. You know it is Web 2.0 when you see the tag cloud too (although I am not a fan of tag clouds).

I really like the idea of creating contracts around actions. As I talk about in the video below, this can range from the small:

• “If 20 of us get together Bob can get some time to record his kick arse new song in a studio”
• “Let’s get a Wii for the office”
• “We will do a conference in Ajax, Ontario, if 100 people pledge to go”

to the large:

• “Sprint has even fake taxes that they put on your bill. If 1MM of us signup, we will refuse to pay our next bill until they fix this”
• “Let’s boycott Wal-mart until they give people healthcare”

And, everything in between. I am excited to see how this takes off, and if people really see this as a community where they can get together, make something happen, and most of all… see HOPE. It is hard for one person to make a change, but if we get together, anything can happen.