Episode 69: John Richardson of Ethelo

Episode 69: John Richardson of Ethelo Decisions
Intro

Host Drew Ogryzek opens the show with more special mentions and giveaways!

Scott Bellware presents a Ruby Microservices workshop in Vancouver, April 29th and 30th: Retweet https://goo.gl/dTue29 with @vantechpodcast to be entered into a draw for a free ticket! (Drawing and winner announcement on April 22nd, 2017)

There's also an Intro to Virtual Reality Workshop brought to us by Design Lab. Tweet your most pressing VR question, along with http://designlablive.com/vr-workshop @vantechpodcast @designlablive for a chance at a free general enrollment seat. (Drawing and winner announcement on March 29th, 2017)

Special Guest John Richardson of Ethelo Decisions

Special guest John Richardson Founder and CEO Ethelo Decisions, a social enterprise dedicated to new ways of doing group decision making, using online technology. Ethelo was born out of trying to find a way of impacting and improving democracy, and answering the question "What is democracy going to look like in 10, 15, or 20 years or even more importantly, what does it need to look like, if we're going to address the major challenges facing society today?"

With a unique technology that enables groups to make complicated decisions, Ethelo is a mix of commercial enterprise, selling that technology to government and large organizations, and a non-profit organization that provides it for free to citizens and organizations that want to engage citizens in doing democratic decision making.

Ethelo can help groups with strategy, high-value decisions like investments, or engaging the public or experts in developing the framework for legislation and regulations. They have several working demos to explore, including using Ethelo for deciding policy around marijuana legislation, international treaties, a neighborhood park, and participatory budget.

For developers interested in democracy as infrastructure, some exciting plans are on the roadmap. Open sourcing the core algorithm behind Ethelo and launching an API are scheduled for as early as sometime this year.

Meetups Around Town, Mar 27 to Apr 2
Monday, March 27th

Vancouver Legal Hackers (Courthouse Libraries BC 800 Smithe Street) 5:30 PM to 7:30 PM
Public-cloud User Group (CodeCore, 142 W Hastings St), 6:00 PM to 7:30 PM
Information Architecture & Content Strategy (Vancouver Film School - Homer Campus, 420 Homer Street) 6:30 PM to 8:30 PM $5.00/per person
Functional React (Machobear Studios Inc, 1716 Cook St) 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM
HackerNest Vancouver (Istuary Innovation Group, 7/F, 1125 Howe Street) 8:00 PM

Tuesday, March 28th

VPC Camp Tech (Hive Vancouver, #210 - 128 W Hastings St), 1:00 PM
VPC UX Design 101 - Session 2 (Launch Academy, 300-128 W. Hastings) 5:00 PM to 8:00 PM
Women Who Code Vancouver (Microsoft Canada, 11th Floor, 1111 W. Georgia St.) 5:30 PM to 8:30 PM
TechVancouver (Mobify, Suite #420 - 725 Granville Street) 6:00 PM $20.00/per person
Vancouver Clojure (Microsoft Canada, 11th Floor, 1111 W. Georgia St.) 5:30 PM
PyLadies Vancouver (Salesforce, Suite 710 - 375 Water St.) 6:00 PM

Wednesday, March 29th

Wordpress Insider (Needs a Location) 1:00 PM to 2:30 PM
Angular JS Vancouver (PNI Digfital Media Offices, 100 - 425 Carrall Street, 1st Floor) 5:30 PM
(SFU VentureLabs Harbour Centre - Rm 1200, 555 W Hastings St), 6:00 PM
Vancouver Growth Hackers (Bench Accounting, 545 Robson St) 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM
Vancouver Ruby Meetup Group (Unbounce, 4th floor, 401 W Georgia St) 6:30 PM to 8:30 PM

Thursday, March 30th

Internet of Bikes: The Next Big Business Opportunity! (JJ Bean Coffee Roasters, 460 Railway St) 12:00 PM to 1:00 PM
YVR Startups (Istuary Idea Labs, 7/F, 1125 Howe Street) 7:00 PM
DDD/CQRS/ES Practitioners (The Tribe, 68 Water Street, 4th floor) 5:00 PM to 7:00 PM
VanQ (STAT Search Analytics, 704 Alexander Street) 5:30 PM
Women Can Tech - YVR (Progressa, 2000 - 1500 W. Georgia Street) 6:00 PM
Full Indie (The Butcher and Bullock, 911 West Pender Street) 6:00 PM
VPC Startup Drinks (131 Water Kitchen & Bar, 131 Water St.) 6:00 PM
Vancouver Drupal Users Group (The Network Hub, 3rd Floor, 422 Richards Street) 6:30 PM
StartupBlink Vancouver 7:00 PM

Friday, March 31st

DevOps Days YVR 2017 (UBC Robson Square, Robson Street on Hornby) 9:00 AM to Saturday, April 1st 5:30 PM
The Tribe Tech Events (The Tribe, 68 Water Street, 4th floor) 5:00 PM to 8:00 PM

Saturday, April 1st

DevOps Days YVR 2017 (UBC Robson Square, Robson Street on Hornby) 9:00 AM to Saturday, April 1st 5:30 PM

Theme music by A Shell In The Pit from the game Parkitect

The Vancouver Tech Podcast is a weekly show focusing on the growing tech industry in the city of Vancouver. Get caught up on the events and meetups around town, startups, new businesses, developers, designers, community programs, and news. Each episode includes an interview with an outstanding member of our community.

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