Gov 2.0 Roundup: Week of February 18, 2011

A California Representative introduces legislation to protect consumer privacy online, state and local government employ crowdsourcing tools to gather citizen feedback, CIA gets social, President Obama has dinner plans with some of the best known representatives of the high tech industry, and Gov20LA founder Alan Silberberg shares takeaways from the most recent conference, all in this week’s version of the Gov 2.0 Roundup.

—Earlier this week, California Democratic Representative Jackie Speier introduced the “Do Not Track Me Online” bill into Congress. If passed, the bill would allow the Federal Trade Commission to enact and enforce consumer protections similar to the popular “Do Not Call” legislation that allows consumers to opt-out of telemarketing calls. Consumer privacy advocate group Consumer Watchdog prais. e the move, and assert that allowing consumers to control their personal information will create a win-win situation for both consumers and businesses. While government agencies are barred from using cookies to collect and track people online, it will be interesting to see how private sector businesses react if the bill is passed.

—Abraham Lincoln’s idea of a “government by the people, for the people” is being actualized in ways the former president could never have imagined. In many state and local governments, like Oakland County, Michigan, officials are developing online tools and websites where citizens can interact with government, sharing ideas about budgets, spending, and eliminating government waste. In an article at this week’s Government Computer News, author Kevin McCaney gives examples of how Oakland County and other government entities are using crowdsourcing tools as a way to solicit feedback, rank spending proposals, and help citizens become more involved.

—CIA has enhanced its website with YouTube, Flickr, and interactive games in an effort to communicate better with the public. That public includes kids, who can take a K-9-cam guided tour of CIA headquarters.

—A veritable who’s who of high-tech luminaries will be joining President Obama in San Francisco tonight for what is certain to be interesting dinner conversation. Among the attendees will be Yahoo! CEO Carol Bartz, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Jobs from Apple, Google CEO Eric Schmidt, and Dick Costolo, CEO of Twitter. I don’t know about you, but I think it would be fascinating to be a fly on the wall for this event.

—“The amount of listening and learning going on now at all levels of government, whether international or local, is vast.” That’s just one of the insights shared by Alan Silberberg, founder of the successful Gov20LA conference, in a Huffington Post piece where he talks about what he learned from the most recent conference. Silberberg goes on to talk about how open government is having a positive impact well beyond keeping citizens informed, namely that “the explosion of open data is creating new pathways for entrepreneurs to attack centuries old problems in some cases.” Silberberg’s post offers an excellent high-level recap of the insights gleaned from one of the Gov 2.0 world’s most lauded events.