I have been asked, both in forums and through email, to prepare something that is more detailed and 'easy to read' about my take on the PowerVoteNow idea.
I would like to first and foremost point out that I am in NO way affiliated with PowerVoteNow, nor is this page to be interpreted as my support of this idea, validation of this idea, verification of potential legal issues surrounding this idea or any other indication of approval/support from me. I was asked to build this page to give my impressions on the idea, that is all.
PowerVoteNow is not my idea, my company, affliated with me, my company or any subsidiaries of my company.
This information, for all practical purposes, should be considered for 'entertainment value' only.

Now that we've got that cleared up, here is my interpretation of how PowerVote works, or could work, as it has been explained in the forums.

Please Note: I may be completely WRONG about all of the information on this page, this is just my interpretation of it.

Step 1:
You, or someone else, discovers leglislation that you are 'against' or 'for'. That legislation is added to the PowerVote system for all to see, along with half of your initial deposit amount (because PV keeps the other half). The example we will follow here assumes that you, and every other person who wants to deposit toward this action, are giving $200 each as deposits.
It might look something like this:
OPEN AGENDA ITEMS
IDTitle
Stance
Backing Funds
Depositors
HR1234Motion to Suspend the Patriot Act
SUPPORT
$100
1


Step 2:
Once the item hits the Agenda, others are able to add deposits to back it as well.
The amount then increases in the 'Backing Funds' column accordingly.

OPEN AGENDA ITEMS
IDTitle
Stance
Backing Funds
Depositors
HR1234Motion to Suspend the Patriot Act
SUPPORT
$100,000
1,000


Step 3:
The PowerVote system will have a selected politician, called the 'Whip', who will be notified of the information on the Agenda.
The WHip can also be the person who first puts an issue on the PowerVoteNow Agenda - though they will not be providing any deposits to support it.
The Whip can then use that information to put pressure on politicians who, in the case of this example, are 'Opposed' to the Motion to Suspend the Patriot Act.
The Whip applies this pressure by saying, "There is 100k in backing for this motion. If you (the opposition) do not change your stance to support this, instead of oppose it, that money will be used to defeat you in the next election cycle".

Step 4.
The politicians cast their 'yay' or 'nay' votes on the issue.
The Whip takes note of which politicians voted, in the case of this example, 'nay' - and then the Whip sends their recommendation back to PowerVote as to the best way to use the funds.
Basically, any politician who voted 'nay' on this example would be listed as someone to 'defeat' in the next election cycle.

Step 5:
Once the Whip provides their recommendation, half of the deposited funds from each depositing member would be returned to those depositing members, along with the recommendation provided by the Whip.
The balance of deposits for that Agenda item would be reduced to zero - but a record would be kept as to the total that had been listed for that Agenda item for future reference purposes.
CLOSED AGENDA ITEMS
IDTitle
Stance
Backing Funds
Depositors
HR1234Motion to Suspend the Patriot Act
SUPPORT
$100,000
1,000


Since there are votes taken by politicians on nearly a daily basis, from the time they enter or continue on in office after an election is completed, there is no way to know who will be running against them, or if the individual politician will even be running for another term, until the next election cycle starts.
Therefore, some type of running record must be kept to monitor the support/opposition from each individual politician who is ever contacted by the Whip in regards to this system.
Basically, there are only four different outcomes to any interaction between the Whip and another politician:
  • Politician did not agree with the Whip's agenda to begin with, but voted WITH the Whip in the end (OS)
  • Politician did agree with the Whip's agenda to begin with, and voted WITH the Whip in the end (SS)
  • Politician did not agree with the Whip's agenda to begin with, and voted AGAINST the Whip in the end (OO)
  • Politician did agree with the Whip's agenda to begin with, but voted AGAINST the Whip in the end (SO) One way to keep this information stored, and available for review, could be in a table that displayed the total values of all votes the politicians involved ended up casting, and how those votes related to the Whip.
    The table below, using 'Sen. A' through 'Sen. H' as example politician names, and sorted by those names, is an example.

    Politician
    OS
    SS
    OO
    SO
    Tot Pos
    Tot Neg
    Avg
    Sen. A
    1
    5
    0
    2
    6
    2
    3
    Sen. B
    0
    4
    1
    1
    4
    2
    2
    Sen. C
    0
    1
    0
    2
    6
    2
    1
    Sen. D
    3
    0
    2
    3
    3
    5
    0.6
    Sen. E
    2
    3
    0
    0
    5
    0
    5
    Sen. F
    0
    9
    0
    0
    9
    0
    9
    Sen. G
    1
    5
    2
    1
    6
    3
    2
    Sen. H
    1
    5
    2
    4
    6
    6
    0
    The table above shows that 4 politicians have voted more 'against' the Whip than 'with' the Whip. (red background)
    It also shows that 3 politicians voted more 'with' the Whip than 'against' the Whip. (green background)
    It also shows that 1 politician voted just as many times 'for' the Whip as 'against' the whip. (gray background)

    In order to determine which politician has the 'worst' voting record 'against' the whip, we simply sort the information a different way;

    Politician
    OS
    SS
    OO
    SO
    Tot Pos
    Tot Neg
    Avg
    Sen. F
    0
    9
    0
    0
    9
    0
    9
    Sen. E
    2
    3
    0
    0
    5
    0
    5
    Sen. A
    1
    5
    0
    2
    6
    2
    3
    Sen. B
    0
    4
    1
    1
    4
    2
    2
    Sen. H
    1
    5
    2
    4
    6
    6
    0
    Sen. D
    3
    0
    2
    3
    3
    5
    0.6
    Sen. C
    0
    1
    0
    2
    6
    2
    1
    Sen. G
    1
    5
    2
    1
    6
    3
    2
    In the above table, the same information is displayed as the previous table, but is now organized to show the vote averages (Avg) from 'worst record' to 'best record'.

    Though the previous two tables show us the voting records of each politician that dealt with the Whip, it doesn't break down the details of what they actually voted 'for' or 'against', nor does it give any indication as to how much was deposited toward the votes they were involved in.
    In order to show that information, a different report can be generated that looks like this:

    (Using Sen. H as the example)
    Sen. H
    IDTitleDateVotedTotal DepositsPolsShare
    HR1234Motion to Suspend the Patriot ActFeb 19, 08N$100,000 (a)10$500 (b)
    HR1239Proposition to Suspend Income TaxFeb 29, 08N$5,000,00030$166,666
    HR1254Budget Proposal for Iraq WarMar 23, 08N$10,00020$500
    HR1334Motion to Impose Sanctions on IranJun 19, 08N$20,00020$1,000
    HR1356Motion to form investigatory commissionAug 5, 08N$100,00050$2,000
    HR1384Budget Proposal for Bridge to NowhereOct 28, 08N$2,0005$400
    HR1432Motion to Suspend Gun RightsNov 9, 08Y$5,000,00050$1,000,000
    HR1433Motion to change Art. 2 of the ConstitutionJan 18, 09Y$10,000,00025$400,000
    HR1479Motion to expand Federal ReserveFeb 5, 09Y$100,00040$2,500
    HR1485Motion to Suspend the Patriot ActApr 19, 09Y$100,000 (a)20$500 (b)
    HR1504Motion to abolish the IRSMay 4, 08Y$20,000,00020$1,000,000
    HR1522Motion to wear clown suits while in sessionJul 17, 08Y$100,00020$5,000
    TOTALS
    		$40,432,000$563,766


    There is a lot going on in the above table. I'll start at the top.
    The ID and Title columns show the item number and name of the item on the agenda that was voted on.
    The Date column shows the date the vote took place on the item.
    The Voted column shows how Sen. H voted:
  • A red Y means they supported the item, when the whip opposed it
  • A green Y means they supported the item, and the whip supported it as well
  • A red N means they opposed the item, when the whip supported it
  • A green N means they opposed the item, and the whip opposed it as well The Total Deposits column shows how much, in PowerVote deposits, were slated for this item
    The Pols column shows how many politicians were approached by the Whip AND are being 'graded' by the PowerVote system on this item
    The Share column shows how much of the Total Deposits were to be used for/against Sen. H for this individual vote.

    On the first row of information, you see that the Total Deposits amount is listed as $100,000 (a). The reason for this is because further down the list, the same issue arises a second time (HR1485 Motion to Suspend the Patriot Act), so the same funds were used in both votes.
    Additionally, in the first column you will see the Share is listed as $500 (b). This is because the second vote for this issue had the most Pols listed, so the higher amount is used to determine the Share for Sen. H on this issue.

    Calculating the totals, we see that the total amount of deposits for all of the issues comes to $40,432,000.
    The totals in the 'Share' column are calculated based on A.) How Sen. H voted, B.) How many other politicians had been approached by the Whip on the individual issue, and C.) Sen H's portion of the deposits to be used to either support his opposition in the next election in the case of a 'negative' (red) number, or how much of the opposition support is removed from the total in the case of a 'supportive' (green) number.
    The total amount of 'negative', or 'voted against the Whip' deposits that are Sen H's Share is $1,571,166.
    The total number of 'positive', or 'voted with the Whip' deposits to offset the negatives is $1,074,400.
    This leaves a balance of a 'negative' $563,766 - which will be used to support his opposition in the next election cycle.

    The actual donations to Sen. H's opposition does not come through the PowerVote system. It comes from those who deposited funds on behalf of supporting or opposing the issues listed. These deposits are returned to the individual depositor, along with a list of suggested candidates to oppose with those returned funds.

    If we assume that you deposited $200 for every issue listed above, that means you would have $2400 in the PowerVote system. $1200 of that would be the amount used for the Whip's agenda.
    This also means that there were a total of 404,320 individual $200 deposits into the system to get the numbers to where they are above.
    Using these numbers, this means that in order to get the suggested funding amount of $563,766 to Sen. H's opposition campaign, each depositor would have to send $1.39 per deposit to that campaign. In your case, having deposited for all 12 issues (actually 11 because one is duplicated), you would send $15.34 to that campaign.
    If everyone who deposited followed the advice of the Whip when their deposit was returned, they would also make deposits into that campaign at a rate of $1.39 per deposited issue that Sen. H participated in. This would give the opposing candidate the $563,766 in funding to oppose Sen. H.

    Considerations
    The potential details of the program are too vast to put into extreme detail here without getting into a lot of work on my part.
    There could be other aspects that I am unaware of in regards to how the total amounts of returned deposits are to be used, but I think the information above is basically how it works.

    One thing to note is that Sen. H is listed as a '0' in the Avg colums of the to previous tables (above), this does not automatically mean that Sen. H is 'safe'. The reason for this is that Sen. H voted 'against' the whip on issues that were backed by far greater deposits than those where Sen. H voted 'with' the Whip.

    This is an issue that could cause some problems with trying to use math to determine support/opposition amounts.
    If Sen. H votes 'with' the whip on 1000 issues that are only valued with $10,000 in deposits each, but votes 'against' the whip on only a single issue that has a deposit value of $10,000,000 - its 1000:1 odds 'for', but there will still be deposits 'against' Sen. H in the end.
    I suspect that the 'final word' on who to support/oppose with returned deposits will be left up to the Whip, which would eliminate this problem. The Whip could review the same information, such as the example above, and say "Well, Sen. H may have voted against me half the time, but I think they're swinging more toward our side, so we'll give them a break".

    Submitted for discussion and review,
    CF