Monday night WLUG meeting will be a film screening; US NOW - http://www.usnowfilm.com/ A film project about the power of mass collaboration, government and the internet Us Now follows the fate of Ebbsfleet United, a football club owned and run by its fans; Zopa, a bank in which everyone is the manager; and Couch Surfing, a vast online network whose members share their homes with strangers. The founding principles of these projects -- transparency, self-selection, open participation -- are coming closer and closer to the mainstream of our social and political lives. Us Now describes this transition and confronts politicians George Osborne and Ed Milliband with the possibilities for participative government as described by Don Tapscott and Clay Shirky amongst others. "Linus likes to joke that the official project goal is world domination, possibly there is some truth in that. It would nice to get to the situation where we have democratised knowledge and the ability to actually contribute and change, particularly information technology, across the entire world." Alan Cox July 26th 7:30pm MS4.G.02