Information Research Weblog

Today's Guardian Online has a couple of interesting items. One is on the way the Web is assisting tactical voting in the UK general election (5th May). Using a Website Tacticalvoter.net, a voter can discover whether or not tactical voting will make a difference in their constituency and then 'swop' their vote with someone else in another constituency. So - voter in constituency A (let us say a life-long Labour voter) will agree to vote Liberal Democrat in that constituency, while a partner voter (normally a Liberal Democrat voter) will vote Labour in constituency B. The whole process, of course, is designed to give the party with the best chance of getting rid of a Conservative member of parliament an opportunity to do so. As a Professor of politics has said, it's a kind of proportional representation alternative to the actual electoral system we enjoy in Britain—as well as being an interesting example of the power of the Web.

The other item is on Yahoo's MyWeb—which is actually in the Online Weblog:

My Web is a “personal search engine” that extends users’ existing Yahoo! Search experience by providing a simple way to save, recall and share online information with friends and colleagues. My Web enables users to create their own personal online archive by saving their favourite pages, search results, and search history to My Web. In addition, users can share their information with friends and colleagues via integrated tools such as email, instant messenger, and personal networking provided by Yahoo!’s new Yahoo! 360° tool

Of course, Google has something similar.