Re-posted from FogCityJournal (check there for links) – Re-imagining government got a little easier with the election of President Barack Obama last year. But thirst for civic revival is certainly not new, and neither is the concept of “Government 2.0,” the subject of an inaugural bureaucrat and Web geek-fest this week over in D.C. However,Read… Read more »
Congressman John Culberson (TX) is passionate about the concept of government as platform, government as an enabler. He dreams of a day when 1 million Americans are talking in real time with their elected officials. Google Wave is trying to achieve this. We’re approaching virtual real-time democracy and hope that citizens help build mechanisms forRead… Read more »
Michael Tiemann says that there is no Moore’s Law for software. We are in an economic paradise lost. According to Albert Einstien, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. With global IT spending on the rise and 30% annual waste on bad software (I believeRead… Read more »
Everyblock – Pick your local area and feed of everything you know about that area. Records, public records. Been doing it for two years. Get data in two ways – screen scrapping from gov websites and going to city hall. -Making sites scraper-friendly is an easy win -Diffs not dumps -PDFs are not machine-readable -DescribeRead… Read more »
Everyone I know seems to be arguing about this. I can’t escape the debate; it’s even on Facebook. I know that folks never want to alter the status quo. I guess this stems from an attitude that if change starts, it won’t stop. Women will get the vote, Arizona will become a state. God onlyRead… Read more »
We wanted to let you know of a new course we’ve just added from Web Manager University: an INTENSE two-day “Video Bootcamp” class in Washington, DC October 13-14. Because the format and cost of this class is different from our regular classes, please be sure to read the details below carefully. Please also share thisRead… Read more »
mySociety group from UK…..does sites like FixMyStreet and WhatDoTheyKnow Report problems in your street. Fix rate is about 50% WhatDoTheyKnow – archives of FOIA requests and answers TheyWorkForYou – politicians, what they said, and what they do Lessons to look for – 1 – Combine services that normal people want with transparency even if theyRead… Read more »
I’m listening to the nation’s first technology officer, Aneesh Chopra at the Gov 2.0 Summit. Mr. Chopra serves as an assistant to the President and he makes sure the President get the best advice about technology. He’s responsible for surfacing new ideas and making sure they’re brought to the table for discussion. He is responsibleRead… Read more »
Clay Johnson of Sunlight Labs: 47 Open Source Projects….10k, 5k, 2,500 prizes. Local spending – Uses HTML 5 to pick budget for area. Does it for local recovery as well. FBI Fugitive Concentration – Memory card game Flyontime.us – probability of how likely your flight will be delayed Data.gov timeline – plot of the timelineRead… Read more »
At the Gov 2.0 Summit, Federal CTO Aneesh Chopra discussed the forthcoming Open Government Directive. Confirmed on the 120 day deadline set by the President to provide recommendations, Chopra said from day one, we have to better engage the public. Eat our own dogfood. What happened in the days and weeks to follow fell justRead… Read more »