# WeWork Video Script

### Intro / A better world is possible.

What if the future of our cities was shaped by the people that live in them?

What if the future of NYC was crafted by the citizens of NYC?

### Other places are doing it, this future is possible

Societies shaped by citizen participation and emerging technologies are no longer stories of science fiction. These are possible realities and there are many successful, active experiments across the world

For example —
* Berlin engages at-risk youth to redesign city spaces using the video-game minecraft
* Taipei uses participatory democracy models to draft digital legislation
* Madrid croudsources proposals from citizens and executes them based on citizen votes

### Current Challenge

What if the future of NYC was crafted by the citizens of NYC? With the power of AI and modern Web technologies, we believe that this is absolutely possible!

BIOS

We are building, Talk to NYC, a community-run, AI-powered multi-media platform to forge stronger connections between NYC citizens and city decision makers. We view this platform as an adaptable and reproducible model for future democracies in cities world-wide.

Many New Yorkers want to participate in city governance but it is hard. Information of about local governance activities (e.g. community board meetings) is hard to find and even if people have the information, in order to participate, they must attend meetings that last for hours, where only the loudest voices are heard.

On the flip side, city officials are overwhelmed. The size of New York City is enormous (each district averages 160,000 peolple!), understanding and tackling the concerns of the community is very difficult. There is no good platform for them to engage with citizens, at scale.

### The Talk to NYC platform...

* crowdsources concerns and ideas directly from the community using an AI powered discussion tool
* promotes open knowledge, data and tools
* promotes transparency and holds representatives accountable by acting as the community watchdog
* creates spaces for government and citizens to come together for deliberation and action (both online and offline)
* organizes training camps for community learning and development

### Where we are now:

We launched Talk to NYC in districts 1 and 2, during the primary elections this year.
* used AI facillitated tool pol.is to crowdsource citizen concerns
* we used this information to question district council candidates at debates and in-person interviews
* when we interviewed the candidated we also questiones them on their views on participation models and introduced them to particpatory tools
* we helped interested candidates use these technology tools to hear the concerns of their constituents and generate discussion on specific issues (e.g. transportation issues)
* we made community partners
* we made organizational partners
* worked with district members to strategize a people's repository for housing-related issues
* we also worked with local org betaNYC to expand the People's Roadmap to a Digital New York City

### Where we are going?

In January 2018 we will expand the Talk to NYC platform in districts 1 and 2

Our goal is to have 51 Talk To NYC teams in 3 years in advance of the 2021 election.

We believe that each district needs a team so that the specific needs of each district can be addressed.

The Talk to NYC platform will also be used to connect districts and organizations around shared concerns and projects.

### What we will do with funding?

The funding is critical to helping us demonstrate the power and viability of the Talk of NYC platform.

Funding we will allow us to

* grow our team
* develop training camps to teach community members the skills and knowledge needed to run the platform (the training opportunities will be open to all interested community members — youth, adults and seniors)
* expand our new media and creative storytelling strategies
* extend Talk to NYC platform into multiple districts

### What challenges will we face?

one of the biggest media challenges is to create content that is accessible and interesting to a diverse audience. This will require using creative storytelling to promote comprehension, interest, and engagement. We are actually really about this challenge because our times call for new
approches to synthesizing and representing information

The next challenge is the scale and diversity of New York — we speak so many different languages, come from different countries, different education levels. Finding solutions to such a diversity of problems can provide a wealth of information for other cities to use.

NYC is a tremendously unique city, we will focus on having an adaptive and agile processes to quickly identify and action challenges.

Questions

About Your Idea

### What problem is your idea, business, or organization solving?

What if the future of NYC was crafted by the citizens of NYC? With the power of AI and modern Web technologies, we believe that this is absolutely possible!

Many New Yorkers want to participate in city governance but it is hard. Information of about local governance activities (e.g. community board meetings) is hard to find and even if people have the information, in order to participate, they must attend meetings that last for hours, where only the loudest voices are heard.

On the flip side, city officials are overwhelmed. The size of New York City is enormous (each district averages 160,000 peolple!), understanding and tackling the concerns of the community is very difficult. There is no good platform for them to engage with citizens, at scale.

We are building, Talk to NYC, a community-run, AI-powered multi-media platform to forge stronger connections between NYC citizens and city decision makers. We view this platform as an adaptable and reproducible model for future democracies in cities world-wide.

### How do you, your business, or organization interact with your community?

We are setting up a platform for all district members — citizens, small business owners, local organizations and district representatives — to engage with each other and take actions for the betterment of the district.

* crowdsources concerns and ideas directly from the community using an AI powered discussion tool
* uses open knowledge, data and tools to empower people to participate
* holds representatives accountable by acting as the community watchdog
* creates online and offline spaces for government and citizens to come together for deliberation and action
* organizes training camps for community learning and development

### If you were awarded a Creator Awards prize, what new benchmarks would you be able to reach?

The funding is critical to helping us expand the power and viability of the Talk of NYC platform.

Funding we will allow us to

* grow our team
* develop training camps to teach community members the skills and knowledge to run the platform (the training opportunities will be open to all interested community members — youth, adults and seniors)
* expand our new media and creative storytelling strategies
* extend Talk to NYC platform into multiple districts