Townhall 140: Bringing Twitter and Politics Together

How long does it take to develop an idea, launch a website, and host the first online event? Just one weekend for the team that created Townhall 140, a video and Twitter based platform that allows users to go face-to-face with leaders on political issues."The fundamental problem that we're trying to address is that it's really hard to communicate with our government even though social media has given us the potential to bring us closer than we've ever been before. The general concept I was trying to address is that democracy shouldn't be so hard with the technology that we have," said Monica S. Liu '12, one of the creators the site.

Townhall 140 uses a Twitter feed on one side of the page, where users vote up or down on certain issues that they care about. Users get 140 characters initially and then the most voted-up tweets get a chance to live video chat with the designated leader.

Townhall 140 began its development last Friday night, as part of the Harvard iLab's "Startup Scramble." Over a hundred students and local entrepreneurs pitched ideas. Liu pitched her idea "Gov 140," which grew into Townhall 140 through input from team members who included people from the Kennedy School, Harvard Law School, Harvard School of Education, as well as other Harvard College students. The video platform was made available by the designer and developer for Tokbox, Jonathan Mumm.

On Nov. 13 the site held its first live video chat, or "virtual town hall," hosting Trey Grayson, the director of the Institute of Politics, to talk about Occupy Harvard. Although the team believed the event was a success, Townhall 140 has bigger plans for their project.

"We're trying to see how we can move the product forward and how to expand into other areas,"  said Peter N. Hadar '13, who was formerly affiliated with the project. "Getting more leaders and possibly improving our version of the product. In the coming weeks, we're hoping to make the site more visible and get more users."

This post has been revised to reflect the following correction.

CORRECTION: November 16, 2011

The Nov. 15 post "Townhall 140: Bringing Twitter and Politics Together" misidentified Peter N. Hadar '13's position within Townhall 140. He is, in fact, currently unaffiliated with the project.