6 websites bringing democracy into the 21st century

Democracy is really just about having an opinion. Represent is a strangely addictive site (think Tinder, but with a purpose) which shows how your opinions compare to everyone else’s. Anyone can ask a question, everyone can see the answers. If we were inventing democracy now, this would be a big chunk of it. It's in closed beta, but believe me - it's great fun. Sign up for an early invite now!

Whatleads.to helps people build "theories of change" together. You can state an aim, and then other people can add other aims that lead to yours, and so on smaller and smaller until you have a detailed map of what you want to achieve. Why don't we give it a go with the NHS?

Loomio is a system for online group decision-making, with support for proposals, discussion and voting. They also have a long-term plan to implement liquid democracy, where everyone has a vote on everything, but you can give someone else your vote on a particular issue, if they know more than you. For instance, I might decide to give Cory Doctorow my vote on digital rights issues, and Ken Robinson my vote on education.

UNGOV digs into the detail with some open policy-making. Rather than the civil service creating detailed policy proposals, UNGOV lets anyone contribute. If you're an expert on something, you can add your expertise directly. My guess is that governments will be working things out this way in the future.

If you're lucky enough to live in Stroud, you'll be able to vote for Richard Wilson in May. He's standing on a direct democracy platform called MyStroudMP, and all his constituents will be able to say how they want him to vote on issues in Parliament. This has been proposed before, with YOURvoice in the EU elections, and another candidate back in 2010, but it's great to see people still trying to make it happen.

The OpenPolitics Manifesto is an open-source political manifesto built by citizens. Anyone can propose a change on any subject, and then changes can be voted on by everyone who's had a change accepted so far. With policy ideas across all areas, there's enough there now that I've decided to stand for election on it in May, and we've even formed a party around it, Something New. We need help, so sign up now!