The Conservatives are officially in love. After weeks of flirtation with the use of Crowdsourcing in their reviews of Labour’s budget and election manifesto, the Tories have provided further evidence that their party might actually hold legitimate feelings towards the concept.

If Britain’s electoral candidates require any further reason to justify Crowdsourcing as a communication tool with voters, Microsoft’s latest play-thing could be of some considerable interest to them. Microsoft’s ‘TownHall’ software aims to replicate the experience of a town hall meeting place inside an online arena.