First, once you fire up red | blue, the phone either connects to the GPS on your phone and gets your latitude and longitude, or asks you to input your U.S. address (depending on your version of the application). The phone then connects to the internet to send that information to the Gravity Monkey servers.
A special thanks to Mike Frumin and FundRace for the geocoded FEC data and the inspiration — indeed, red | blue is merely a mobile extension of Mike and Eyebeam’s innovative web site. If you haven’t checked FundRace out yet, you really should.
Then, like a magical greenback Geiger counter, red | blue will tell you if you’re in Republican or Democratic territory, and will also show you the total amount of contributions for Republicans or Democrats in your area.A simple algorithm calculates the optimal radius around your location to assess, then generates an index of red or blue that is weighted by proximity — that is, if you’re standing in a Republican town, but at the doorstep of a huge Democratic contributor, the index will lean towards blue.
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