Note: I originally published on my blog but I thought this had a lot of relevance for government web sites. My point is that effective web design does not have to be complicated. In fact, by choosing simplicity you’re making it easier for readers to get the information they need. I was excited to learnRead… Read more »
I’ve been reading Here Comes Everybody by Clay Shirky. It’s a brilliant book on the information revolution that we’re going through. He believes that this revolution is as momentous as the development of the printing press, which triggered the Reformation and religious wars. The rise of amateurs and the expansion of consumer choice has meantRead… Read more »
Vivek Kundra is the newly appointed Chief Information Officer (CIO) for the federal government. He is the first federal CIO ever and previously served as Chief Technology Officer (CTO) for the District of Columbia. He spoke this morning at FOSE, the major government technology tradeshow in Washington, DC. I wanted to write up my notesRead… Read more »
Chris Anderson, of Wired magazine and “The Long Tail” fame, was the keynote speaker at FOSE this morning. He spoke on “For the People and By the People: Delivering on the Promise of Gov 2.0”. Anderson started off with an interesting example – the infamous Twitter fail whale. Countless users have bemoaned the unreliability ofRead… Read more »
Some random thoughts about Transparency Camp 09. Here are my big take-aways from the conference. Excitement: There’s a tremendous amount of enthusiasm among enlightened advocates of government transparency, fueled by the election of Obama and the mainstreaming of Web 2.0 tools like blogging. There’s a real can-do spirit, which is in marked contrast to continuingRead… Read more »
Here’s my notes from an event called “Pimp My Nonprofit.” It was designed to help a nonprofit better use Web 2.0. Lots of similarities to government: Pimp My Nonprofit: Student Movement for Real Change
YouTube is ubiquitous. Millions of people visit the site every day. For the Wired Generation, it’s the functional equivalent of television. Yet, despite the vast audience of YouTube, many government agencies do not make their videos available on the site. Some are even worse and ban their employees from even visiting YouTube. By withholding theirRead… Read more »
Interesting article on Read/Write/Web about government web site managers and social media advocates. Govloop is mentioned as an example. But, best of all, IMHO, is the term that the author comes up for government web folks: Goverati. I like it! http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/government_20_rise_of_the_goverati.php
Have you ever wondered why there’s no ocean.gov? This is a valuable and easy to remember URL that the government doesn’t currently use. And it should, for we all depend on the ocean for the very air we breathe. When I was at NOAA, it was explained to me that there’s no web site atRead… Read more »