Transparency Camp

Today in Washington at the George Washington University campus, people from across the spectrum are coming together to discuss transparency in government. I am not available to attend in person, but I’m following the discussions and observations on Twitter (#tcamp09). The website is available at http://www.transparencycamp.org/.

The website states:
This un-conference is about convening a trans-partisan tribe of open government advocates from all walks — government representatives, technologists, developers, NGOs, wonks and activists — to share knowledge on how to use new technologies to make our government transparent and meaningfully accessible to the public.

There is a wiki at http://barcamp.pbwiki.com/TransparencyCamp

I came across this camp through my Twitter feeds, which are becoming my tip-off and source of news and links to more info. You can get a glimpse of the tweets coming out of Transparency Camp at http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23tcamp09

What does this all mean?
1) We are always connected.
2) Creates lots of learning opportunities.
3) The exchange of knowledge is accelerating.
4) We can overcome limitations of time, space, and our own schedules
5) Social media is expanding participation, interest, and activism by citizens in government.
6) More accountability for politicians
7) More responsibility of citizens
8) Empowerment by the ability to contribute to public discourse
9) People driving technology use and not technology driving people.
10) Innovation, idea generation, and solutions for government