The fame of the Downing Street petition system is spreading: and interestingly, despite what was arguably the ‘worst case scenario’ of 1.7m people signing an anti-government petition, others are keen to follow its example. <a href=”http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oew-brownstein7jul07,0,7002313.story?coll=la-opinion-center”>Quoted in the LA Times today</a>, Eli Pariser of MoveOn.org points to it as an example of how the internet can reconnect citizens in government, going ‘much further’ than existing proposals in this direction by presidential hopeful Barack Obama. After years of us being told that the Americans are so far ahead of us, it’s quite nice to see some kudos coming the other way for once.