Rome 2.0

Rome is a beautiful city, it has a mild climate and is a veritable open-air museum, not to mention the large amount of parks and green it possess. But to live here is not easy because there are many things that do not work, first of all the public transportation. To have a mayor who cares really our city, rather than his interests and those of his “friends”, is therefore vital. Also we had such a major, however, would not be sufficient, because a mayor, no matter how powerful, cannot do everything.

In particular, a mayor can do to the extent that he has the support of citizens and it must be clear that this support can not be exhausted in the mere putting a cross on a voting paper, but must be continuous and constant after the elections too, because the city, in the first place, is ours. A city is a living thing and like any living being it can become ill, hurt, dirty.

Well, the city-dwellers can and must become the immune system of the city: they should monitor the operation, report problems, even intervene to correct certain situations, at least within certain limits. A mayor with hundreds of thousands of volunteers is much more than a mayor, he is the director of an orchestra capable to play songs that no single musician can ever perform, no matter how good.

In order to do this, however, we need technology: Internet, firstly, to create a large digital social network able to condense into a single place the contributions of everybody; mobile devices, secondly, to collect and publish any information at any time, as reporting traffic problems and damage to the road surface, hardship or distress situations, opportunities for improvement and growth. A place for reports but also to exchange ideas, to monitor activities and work, a community of volunteering in the broadest sense of the term.

All that to make Rome a new city, a true European capital, a source of inspiration, respect and admiration from all over the world, but also a better place to live, a Rome 2.0.