Local authorities in the UK spend up to £67.85m every year publishing public notices in local newspapers.The individual cost of publishing a notice can reach over £20 per column cm in some publications, upwards of three times the cost for other adverts. This is resulting in a weighty burden on councils. Local authorities are cryingRead… Read more »
I just noticed a new TED Talk by the first and former White House Deputy CTO Beth Noveck, delivered in Edinburgh, Scotland. She is really the initial instigator of the modern Open Government movement in the United States and is now working to make it a reality worldwide. What I like best about her talkRead… Read more »
Blog originally posted at Social Media Spanish. Recently I have seen more and more discussion about people feeling very uncomfortable with Facebook using their name and image on social ads. I wrote about this last year on the dangers of showing up on Pepto Bismol’s next ad for a chimichanga antidote. People online are becomingRead… Read more »
In Los Angeles city officials want to spend $10 million dollars to do a three year survey of sidewalks to determine which need repair. Citizen Peter Griswold wants to save that money by creating Volunteers for Sidewalk Brigades to complete the sidewalk survey. As reported in a Los Angeles Timesarticle Griswold sates “There are soRead… Read more »
I had an interesting discussion last week with a colleague about the terminology of government. We talk about politicians as moving the ‘levers of power’ and departmental restructures as ‘machinery of government’ (MOG) changes (sometimes used as a verb “we got mogged!”) Lack of progress in bureaucracy is called ‘spinning wheels’ (which often appears toRead… Read more »
In spite of the Obama Administration’s recent $200 million investment in the Big Data Research and Development Initiative many agencies continue to struggle to find the necessary funds for Big Data projects, while others are challenged to build the proper infrastructures to handle them. Simply put, agencies recognize the importance of Big Data, yet ITRead… Read more »
A recent news story in The Economist discussed outsourcing and privatizing of government communications, and used Sandy Springs, GA as an example of a government entity that had outsourced many functions. Suzanne Horsley, an assistant professor in the University of Alabama’s Department of Advertising and Public Relations, was intrigued by the article, and now she’sRead… Read more »
A recent article on Emergency Management Magazine’s website stated, “Surveys consistently indicate that less than 10 percent of the public is considered prepared for a disaster and that percentage is usually closer to 6 percent.” The article deems current strategies to prepare the public for emergencies as inadequate, stating that the threat-based message is deliveredRead… Read more »
Do you have it? I certainly do. It’s not always easy to admit, but I am ready to do it now. I have succumbed to the latest Internet-induced disorder. It’s called FOMO – Fear Of Missing Out – and increasingly people are stepping up and admitting that it’s affecting their social lives. Now, though, it’sRead… Read more »
One of the perils of the digital age, as traditional media goes digital or goes downhill and more and more people rely on the internet for their daily news, is that countries such as Australia are losing ‘editorial’ control over what news is promoted as the ‘top stories’ each day or what links appear atRead… Read more »