So it really is all about me. I mean, us.

Time keeping in step with the Democratic turn in America methinks Though is it "you" the citizen or "you" the consumer and more importantly is the "you" individual or plural.

Netizens is an idea full of promise but it's still not clear that the netizens are capable of the collective action needed to promote and carry through change. Sources of information and possible connectivity between people has certainly grown, not least through blogs like bleeding edge, but for the me the jury is still out on whether this presages a new democratic politics that can break through the limitations of the degraded managed "democracy" of the material world. A democracy where accountability, choice and access are in short supply.

Does the net give us power, or just the illusion of power, or merely solace? New and independent voices and sources of information, or just a place from which the marketeers can easily strip mine the world of culture to create product to sell product?

One site that I think does change the way the netizens of the internet have a form of power that was previously unavailable and without any marketing hype is the UK site TheyWorkForYou.com as they literally 'screen scrape' the UK Governemnts Hansard to keep a track on the politicians and how effective, active or inactive your local MP is up to.

We now need a similar site setup to track our own Australian Federal and State governments so that we can track the status of our own state and federal MP's and in effect hold them accountable if all they do is sit around doing nothing for the constituants that voted them into office.

As an example Anne Begg - Scotland, Aberdeen South which is in the electorate that my brother lives in she has not too bad a rap in comparrison to the 'average'.