Monthly Archives: February 2011

Clinton: There is no silver bullet in the struggle against Internet repression. There’s no “app” for that

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Today in Washington, Secretary of State Clinton reiterated the State Department’s commitment to an Internet freedom policy in a speech at George Washington University. Rebecca MacKinnon, journalist, free speech activist, and expert on Chinese Internet censorship, provided some on the spot analysis immediately following Clinton’s words. MacKinnon made an interesting, and timely, point: there are limits to directly funding certain groups. “I think one of the reasons that the Egyptian and Tunisian revolutions were successful was that they were really home grown, grass roots. At the end of the day, the people in the countries concerned need to really want change and drive that change.”

MacKinnon parsed the considerable complexity of advocating for Internet freedom in the context of Wikileaks and electronic surveillance in other areas of the federal government. For those interested, she elaborated on the issues inherent in this nexus of government and technology in her Senate testimony last year. At some point this winter, there will be a hearing on “CALEA 2″ in the United States Congress that’s going to be worth paying close attention to for anyone tracking Internet freedom closer to home, so to speak.

Should the U.S. support Internet freedom through technology, whether it’s an “app” or other means? To date, so far the State Department has allocated only $20 million of the total funding it has received from Congress, according to a report on Internet censorship from the Senate Foreign Relations Committee obtained by the AFP. (Hat tip to Nick Kristof on that one).

Clinton defended the slow rollout of funding today in her speech (emphasis is added):

“The United States continues to help people in oppressive Internet environments get around filters, stay one step ahead of the censors, the hackers, and the thugs who beat them up or imprison them for what they say online. While the rights we seek to protect are clear, the various ways that these rights are violated are increasingly complex. Some have criticized us for not pouring funding into a single technology—but there is no silver bullet in the struggle against Internet repression. There’s no “app” for that. And accordingly, we are taking a comprehensive and innovative approach—one that matches our diplomacy with technology, secure distribution networks for tools, and direct support for those on the front lines.”

The caution in spending may well also be driven by the issues that the State Department encountered with Haystack, a much celebrated technology for Internet freedom tool that turned out to be closer to a fraud than a phenomenon.

There may be no silver bullet to deliver Internet freedom to the disconnected or filtered masses, per se, but there are more options beyond the Tor Project that people in repressive regimes can leverage. Today, MIT’s Technology Review reported on an app for dissidents that encrypts phone and text communications:

Two new applications for Android devices, called RedPhone and TextSecure, were released last week by Whisper Systems, a startup created by security researchers Moxie Marlinspike and Stuart Anderson. The apps are offered free of charge to users in Egypt, where protesters opposing ex-president Hosni Mubarak have clashed with police for weeks. The apps use end-to-end encryption and a private proxy server to obfuscate who is communicating with whom, and to secure the contents of messages or phone conversations. “We literally have been working night and day for the last two weeks to get an international server infrastructure set up,” says Anderson.

No word on whether they’ve received funding from State yet. For more on today’s speech, read the full report on the State department’s Internet freedom policy at the Huffington Post, Ethan Zuckerman or the ever sharp Nancy Scola on #NetFreedom, which does, in fact, now look like a “big deal.”

Secretary of State Clinton speaks about Internet freedom and technology

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Today in Washington, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is speaking about Internet freedom and technology.

http://c.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f9?isVid=1

The PBS Newshour is also streaming the speech:

http://www.ustream.tv/pbsnewshour

2011 Trend: Deloitte predicts eGovernment will reach an inflection point

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http://c.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f9?isVid=1

2011 predictions from Deloitte Consulting:

In 2011 Deloitte predicts eGovernemt (eGov) usage will reach an inflection point. Across developed countries, the proportion of businesses that use eGov services for at least one process is expected to average over 90 percent, up from 75 percent in 2010. Similarly, the proportion of citizens that use eGov in industrialized countries should rise by at least 10 percentage points. In some countries, the importance of eGov as a way to boost public sector productivity and efficiency may even prompt the appointment of a national Chief Information Officer (CIO) where one did not exist previously.”

For those watching, the United States has had both a CIO and a chief technology officer (CTO) since the beginning of the Obama administration. Both Vivek Kundra and Aneesh Chopra, respectively CIO and CTO, have worked with their staff to go beyond traditional e-government in the context of the open government initiative, evolving from a “vending machine” model, where government simply provides e-services, to where government acts as a platform, releasing data and convening citizens, industry and policy makers to address huge challenges.

Whether Deloitte’s prediction comes true in 2011 for the world remains to be seen. It’s certainly interesting and worth taking note.

“If there was no social networks, this would never have been sparked”-Wael Ghonim

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Wordle of a interview of Ghonim by Steve Garfield

In an interview about the Egyptian revolution on 60 Minutes tonight, Wael Ghonim told Harry Smith that “if there was no social networks, it would have never been sparked. Because the whole thing before the revolution was the most critical thing. Without Facebook, without Twitter, without Google, without YouTube, this would have never happened.”

Block the whole Internet, you’re gonna really frustrate people. One of the strategic mistakes of this regime was blocking Facebook. One of the reasons why they are no longer in power now is that they blocked Facebook. Why? Because they have told four million people that they are scared like hell from the revolution by blocking Facebook. They forced everyone who’s just, you know, waiting to read the news on Facebook, they forced them to go to the street to be part of this.

Ghonim, who has called the galvanic events that swept Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak out of power “Revolution 2.0,” spoke eloquently about the role of social networking in Egypt. “If there was no social networks, this would never have been sparked. Without Facebook, without Twitter, without YouTube, this would never have happened.”

Shortly after the 60 Minutes interview aired on the East Coast of the United States, Ghonim posted another tweet:

.bbpBox36944183608475650 {background:url(http://a1.twimg.com/profile_background_images/170023094/wae_clearl.jpg) #32cef9;padding:20px;} p.bbpTweet{background:#fff;padding:10px 12px 10px 12px;margin:0;min-height:48px;color:#000;font-size:18px !important;line-height:22px;-moz-border-radius:5px;-webkit-border-radius:5px} p.bbpTweet span.metadata{display:block;width:100%;clear:both;margin-top:8px;padding-top:12px;height:40px;border-top:1px solid #fff;border-top:1px solid #e6e6e6} p.bbpTweet span.metadata span.author{line-height:19px} p.bbpTweet span.metadata span.author img{float:left;margin:0 7px 0 0px;width:38px;height:38px} p.bbpTweet a:hover{text-decoration:underline}p.bbpTweet span.timestamp{font-size:12px;display:block}

My message to the dictators of the world: You should at least freak out. Block Facebook and cancel Fridays. #Jan25 #SidiBouzid #WhatsNextless than a minute ago via webWael Ghonim
Ghonim

What happens next in Egypt is not clear. As Anthony Shadid wrote this week, it’s uncharted ground. What is clear is that history has been made, and in Wael Ghonim’s eyes, “this was an Internet Revolution.”

Developing open source and open government at Tech@State

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Open source technology and collaborative models will matter in media, mapping, education, smarter cities, national security, disaster response and much more in 2011 and beyond. The success of open source in building systems that work at scale offers an important lesson to government leaders as well: to meet grand national challenges and create standards for the future, often it’s best to work collectively on them. The hundreds of people who gathered yesterday at the United States Department of State spent the day parsing open source at Tech@State, the technology conference organized by the office of eDiplomacy.

Open source is playing an important role in open government, although it’s hardly a precondition for it. Whether it’s Energy.gov or House.gov moving to Drupal, middleware for open government data or codesharing with CivicCommons, open source matters more than ever.

One challenge that Gunnar Helleksen articulated in his presentation on Open Source for America’s federal open technology report card was that while many agencies are using open source, very few are contributing code or interacting with the community. As Melanie Chernoff pointed out, the Obama administration has shown unprecedented interest in open source.

The Administration generally emphasizes transparency, participation, and collaboration as government goals while maintaining a “technology neutral” policy. Yet they have shown unprecedented interest in open source.  Macon Phillips & Dave Cole of whitehouse.gov talked about how open source can help the federal government achieve its engagement and collaboration goals in their OSFA award acceptance speech.

Phillips said that the White House has released more open source code this week, available at WhiteHouse.gov/tech. Perhaps one of the most important slides from the entire day came from his presentation, where he noted that the accessibility module that the White House had released was being used by nearly 1000 websites. When we work on our platform and contribute back to the public,” said Phillips, “it’s part of our service to the public.”

Given its mission, however, the State Department will likely always need place limits on the radical transparency some equate with open government, but as Susan Swart, the department CIO, observed at Dipnote, “technology is the key enabler of our information enterprise.” Open source will be a part of that enterprise going forward, whether it’s MediaWiki, WordPress or Drupal.

Many of the conversations, videos and presentations from the Tech@State open source conference are captured below.

Open Source at the State Department and what the White House and HSS are doing with it

Video of Swart, Aneesh Chopra, CTO of the United States, Macon Phillips, White House new media director, and Todd Park, CTO at HHS, is embedded below:

http://www.ustream.tv/flash/viewer.swf

Open standards matter here too. As Phillips observed, the choice to use the H.264 online video standard and develop in HTML5 meant that when Apple released the iPad, the company featured WhiteHouse.gov, since users could go and watch video there. (In this context, at least, the White House avoided “shiny app syndrome.”)

As Chopra noted, the U.S. moved forward into the pilot phase of an open source model for health data systems as the fruits of the Direct Project came to Minnesota and Rhode Island. The Direct Project allows for the secure transmission of health care data over a network. Some observers have dubbed it the Health Internet , and the technology has the potential to save government hundreds of millions of dollars, along with supporting the growth of new electronic health records systems. “Healthcare information will be shared around the United States, powered by the direct protocol,” said Chopra. He says that’s a philosophy to “engage entrepreneurs as problem solvers” in the context of open energy, transportation, where government platforms can spur innovation.

No where is that locus more dynamic that in the release of open health data from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). As Brian Kalish reported for NextGov, HHS wants to be a data ‘sugar daddy’, so to speak. To put it another way, HHS is making community health information as useful as weather data, and here come the healthcare apps as a result. Tens of thousands of people have used open health data in the iTriage app to find local health centers.HHS CTO Park says that the new HealthData.gov will be launching next week. In the meantime, HealthIndicators.gov is already live. Look for more activity in that space.

How We Got Here: Industry and Open Source Software

Jeremy Allison, creator of Samba, Chris DiBona, open source and public sector programs manager at Google, and Darren Krape, of State Department, offered up a frank discussion of the history open source and industry. Looking back, a lot of people thought that open source gathered steam because proprietary software wasn’t providing change fast enough, said DiBona. “They needed something that moved faster.”

In that context, Dibona described open source software as a “remarkable form of liberation,” with benefits wholly separate from philosophy. “As an end user, you don’t even know that you’re using it,” he said “I see it as the fruits of labor of tens of thousands of open source developers.”

Dibona asserted that open source can allow developers to move more quickly, with respect to bugs or building out features. It can also disrupt the industry. As he noted, “the computer business has been profitable but frankly some things don’t deserve to be any more.”

Allison similarly observed that  lot of the time the easiest way for an organization to get needed functionality is to “just download something and make it work.” He also referred to the role of software patents in technology, with respect to the ability of their owner to shut down innovation. “Software patents handcuff entrepreneurs,” he said to scattered applause, and suggested that the issue could cost government “billions.”

http://www.ustream.tv/flash/viewer.swf

Code for America and “Zen and the Art of Open Source”

David Eaves kicked off with a great lightning talk on Code for America. After Eaves answered questions, Greg Elin, chief data architect at FCC, Dr. Linton Wells, director of center for technology and national security policy at the National Defense University, Deb Bryant, public sector communities manager at the Oregon State University Open Source Lab, and this correspondent talked about some of the fears, misconceptions and case studies that exist in the open source world.

http://www.ustream.tv/flash/viewer.swf

Key takeaways:

For Elin, open source and open data “go hand in hand.” The biggest thing he needs support for is security patching. For handing open data on the scale that the FCC requires, commercial software doesn’t address their needs; they were able to solve their issues by writing Python code, leveraging open source and integrating it with commercial software. In his view, one area where open source is superior lies in procurement and prototyping, given that you can do either for free.

For Bryant, it’s that many of the same critiques that people levy against open source exist for proprietary software. You won’t always have support, bug reports won’t always be fixed and the person who wrote code won’t always be available. Open source isn’t free, given the support requires time and money, but there’s a lot for “fear, uncertainty and doubt” out there, also known as “FUD.”

For Wells, it was that the combination of open source, social media and government that we saw in Haiti showed the promise of “what can be done” in terms of situational awareness and assistance. In 2011, that combination is being tried in many more places.

Open Communications: The Changing Media Landscape

A remarkable historic confluence brought the Tech@State conferees to the State Department on the day that President Mubarak stepped down in Egypt after weeks of protests. At 3 PM, many attendees of Tech@State gathered to watch President Obama’s remarks on Egypt on the big screen in the main meeting room.

As the president observed: “There are very few moments in our lives where we have the privilege to witness history taking place. This is one of those moments. This is one of those times. The people of Egypt have spoken, their voices have been heard, and Egypt will never be the same.”

http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/all/modules/swftools/shared/flash_media_player/player5x2.swf

The historic day framed a provocative discussion on how media has changing between Saad Khan, seed investor at CMEA Capital Katherine Maher,  ICT Program Officer at National Democratic Institute, and Habib Haddad, founder YallaStartup, Yamli, co-creator Alive in Egypt. That video is embedded below.

http://www.ustream.tv/flash/viewer.swf

Open Source vs Government Culture: Creating Change

The culture of open source and the culture of government aren’t always aligned. As many people in those world know, open source wasn’t validated as a legitimate alternative to proprietary technologies until the middle of the last decade. Now it’s running straight into the “beast of bureaucracy,” with varying results. The conversation between Richard Boly, State Dept, Emma Antunes, NASA, Lisa Wolfisch, GSA, Matthew Burton, Dept. of Treasury, and Gwynne Kostin, GSA, is worth listening to in that context.

http://www.ustream.tv/flash/viewer.swf

Tech@State Unconference

Today the conversations continue at an unconference at the National Democratic Institute. Details are at http://techatstate-oss-unconf.eventbrite.com

Deb Bryant on open source at the Tech@State unconference

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Deb Bryant, public sector communities manager at the Oregon State University Open Source Lab, kicked off the Tech@State unconference on open source at the National Democratic Institute today.

The short video below, capturing some of her thoughts on the evolution of open source in government, are worth considering, particularly with respect its use internationally. As Bryant pointed out, for instance, Brazil has been doing open source for a decade. “They’re really the Simon Bolivar of software down there.”

The schedule for the Tech@State unconference is evolving at Open4m.org/NDI. It bids to be an interesting day.

3 words from the Tech@State unconference

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On Friday, the fifth Tech@State conference at the United States Department at State focused on the role of open source in government, industry and society. Today, there is a Tech@State unconference on open source at the National Democratic Institute. In keeping with the tradition of an unconference – sometimes called a barcamp – the day kicked off with a introduction where every attendee shared his or her name, affiliation and three words that describe who they are, what they care about, what they’ve come to learn or what they do. Or all three. Below is a wordle that shows the frequency of words used.

The schedule for the Tech@State unconference is evolving at Open4m.org/NDI. It bids to be an interesting day.

2011 Gov 2.0 and Open Government Events Calendar

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Tomorrow, another great Tech@State event kicks off at the State Department in Washington, D.C. In New York City, the city’s first chief digital officer, will put on the capstone on Social Media Week at an open government forum. Out in Los Angeles, people will gather at KPCC for a digital diplomacy forum. It will be a busy Friday but these three events are only a few coming up that sit in the intersection of technology, citizens and government coming up this year.

As J.D. Lasica reported in his comprehensive Socialbrite list of 2011 social media, tech marketing conferences, there won’t be a Gov 2.0 Expo. (For an explanation of why O’Reilly won’t be doing the Expo this year, visit Quora.) There will, however be many other places for people to gather, talk and learn about Gov 2.0 in 2011 — just take a look through the many Govloop event listings. For a broader selection, Socialbrite has a terrific calendar of calendar of 2011 nonprofit conferences.

There will be any number of citizen-generated unconferences around the world in 2011, where the attendees generate the program. They’ll include CityCamps, BarCamps, PodCamps or MobileCamps. Check out the CityCamp calendar to find one near you and keep an eye out for CityCamp meetups in February.

The following listings are by no means comprehensive but should serve as a starting point if you’re wondering what’s happening, when and where. If you know about more Gov 2.0 events that should be listed here, please let me know at alex@oreilly.com or @digiphile.

Gov 2.0 LA

This Los Angeles conference brings a “West Coast” sensibility to the Gov 2.0 conversation, with a particular emphasis on social media and speakers from the diplomatic, marketing and consulting worlds. For a sense of what the 2010 event held, read On Language: Government 2.0 jargon and technology or a history lesson in disruptive innovation applied to modern government at Gov 2.0 LA.

Website: gov20la.org

DataCamp

February 13, Boston, MA
February 19, Seattle, WA
Philadelphia and DC TBD.

Code for America is hosting a set of “data camps” in its host cities this winter. Here’s why: “City governments have a lot of information which is useful to all of us. This ranges from maps of local parks to building footprints to real-time 911 calls. We all have an interest in our budget information, legistlative documents and other resources that we use in collective decision-making and deliberation. Not all of this information is currently available for all cities, even though much of it is public record. The “Open Data” movement is a way to work on getting information into machine-readable formats, allowing for easy publishing, sharing, and reuse. We’re hosting DataCamps in CfA’s cities this year to build communities around making city data more open and accessible to allow citizens to help cities work better. DataCamp is a event focusing on skill-building and collaborative work on city data. It is an opportunity for interested parties in a city to work together, and build a network of people with shared interested in improving civic communications and information management.”

Website: Code for America datacamps

2011 Computer-Assisted Reporting Conference

Feb. 24 to 27, 2011 — Raleigh, N.C.
Data journalism is a key component of the Gov 2.0 world. If government releases data, data journalism must evolve to validate, analyze and tell stories with it.

Website: www.ire.org/training/conference/

Social Media for Government Conference

February 14-17, 2011
Social media is but one component of Gov 2.0, alongside open data, collective intelligence or a rethinking of how services are provided, but it’s clear that it’s important.

Website: www.aliconferences.com/conf/social_media_govt0211/index.htm

Intelligent Cities Meetup

February 23rd, Washington, DC
“Intelligent Cities, a National Building Museum initiative, supported by its partners TIME and IBM and funded by The Rockefeller Foundation, explores the intersection of IT and urban design to understand where we are, where we want to be, and how to get there.” Meetups are planned for San Francisco, NYC and Chicago.

Website: Meetup.com/Intelligent-cities

Transportation Camp

March 5-6, NYC, New York
March 19-20, San Francisco, CA
TransportationCamp is a new unconference about transportation and technology.

Website: transportationcamp.org

South by Southwest Interactive Festival

March 10-15, Austin, Texas
This year’s SXSWi will include many sessions that fall under the umbrella of Gov 2.0, including government officials talking about open government, citizens talking about new apps or platforms, and new services or applications that will be relevant to both. Here’s just a sampling.

Website: sxsw.com/interactive

2011 Web and New Media Conference

March 17–18, 2011, Washington, DC
This conference is for government new media managers and webmasters, many of whom are wearing both hats in 2011. It’s proven to be an excellent networking and educational forum.

Website: http://www.usa.gov/webcontent/wmu/conference/2011/index.shtml

Web 2.0 Expo

March 28-31, San Francisco, CA
October 10-13, NYC, NY
There are many lessons for Gov 2.0 from Web 2.0, including the power of platforms to catalyze innovation, investment and more agile government.

Website: web2expo.com

NASA Open Source Summit

March 29-30, Mountain View California

From the organizers: “On March 29 & 30, NASA will host its first Open Source Summit at Ames Research Center in Mountain View California. This event will bring together engineers and policy makers across NASA and respected members of the open source community to discuss the challenges with the existing open source policy framework, and propose modifications that would make it easier for NASA to develop, release, and use open source software.”

Website: NASA Open Source Summit

Media Access to Government Information Conference (MAGIC)

April 12, National Archives, Washington, D.C.

From the organizers: “MAGIC is a collaborative, one-day conference sponsored by the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) and Duke University’s DeWitt Wallace Center for Media and Democracy that will:

  • Explore obstacles and opportunities for access to government information by journalists and others writing about public affairs in the digital age;
  • Include government officials, reporters, scholars, and Non Government Organization (NGO) leaders who can contribute insights into how journalists can better discover, access, and use digital government information; and
  • Inform government professionals about the use of technology to provide better access to government information

The conference is free and open to the public, though registration is required. Breakfast, lunch, and refreshments are included. The conference sessions will be videotaped and made available for viewing at a later date. For more information, please contact MAGIC@nara.gov.”

Website: MAGIC

Mobile Citizen Summit

April 16, Washington, D.C.

From the organizers: “You have heard the word, mobile is the new hot thing. You have convinced your management to start using mobile, but how do you actually use mobile to engage citizens and create impact? The Mobile Citizen Summit is a one-day learning laboratory for those interested in applying mobile technologies to empower, fuel and drive citizen engagement in the public good. Our focus is on providing you with informative and practical discussions.”

Website: Mobile Citizen Summit

Transparency Camp

April 30-May 1, Washington, DC
The 2010 Transparency Camp delved into open data, coffee, open government, culture and yes, transparency. Look for more of the same.

Website: transparencycamp.org

Open Government and Innovations Conference

Likely in May 2011, Washington, DC
Applied uses of platforms, social media, culture change and more, all relevant transparency and open government

Website: http://events.1105govinfo.com/events/ogi-open-government-2010/home.aspx

Gov 2.0a

May 6-7, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

From the organizers: “The second annual Gov 2.0a conference is focused on applications of technology to government problems. The conference will be a forum to learn about successful Gov 2.0 applications through case studies, to learn about best practices for Gov 2.0 applications, and to network with other professionals from city and state organizations, community groups, non-profits and the private sector who share interest in the application of technology to improve the functioning of our government.”

Website: Gov20a.com

Fedtalks Open Government Summit

May 11, Washington, D.C.

From the organizers: “FedScoop’s Open Government & Citizen Engagement Summit, part of the FedTalks event series, will bring together leading federal government and industry experts to discuss the state of open government and tech solutions to better engage citizens.”

Website: Fedscoop.com/fedtalks/opengov2011

OpenGov West

May 13-14, Portland, OR
Open government and Gov 2.0 community leaders, public officials, citizens and technologists from all over the West Coast.

Website: opengovwest.org

Local Open Government Summits

May 13-22, 2011, 35+ cities
In 2011, there will be a host of other camps too, as readers will find below, and a new initiative: local open government innovation summits. According to the organizers, “The summits’ overarching objective is to gather citizens and local government staff together in dialogue for knowledge-sharing and relationship-building. It is not necessary to include action planning, identification of next steps, or decision-making into your local summit. A successful outcome is raising awareness of local gov officials that they are not alone as they implement open government programs and that they can access the expertise of the broader open government community. The target is 50+ local summits across the US and internationally.”

Website: opengovplaybook.org

OpenGov Camp

June 4-5, NYC

From the organizers: “OpenGov Camp is a one day conversation on how participation builds transparency to deliver efficiency. We are a community of doers and decision-makers talking about what works—and what doesn’t. Whether you are a developer, journalist, activist, organizer or government employee, you should attend. For one day, we ask you three questions:

  • Where is “local” Open Government going?
  • How can we deepen the knowledge of what Open Government can be?
  • What are the social and technical tools affecting Open Government’s development?”

Website OpenGovNYC

Personal Democracy Forum

June 6-7, New York City, NY
This world-class conference exploring and analyzing technology’s impact on politics and government is back for the 8th year in New York City.

Website: personaldemocracy.com

OSCON 2011

July 25-29, 2011, Portland, OR
The O’Reilly Open Source Convention is the crossroads of all things open source. Open source plays an increasingly important role in government. The processes involved in open source itself have served as a model for open government.

Website: oscon.com/oscon2011

Supernova Hub

Likely in July 2011 in Philadelphia, PA (Unconfirmed)
Technologists, entrepreneurs, business executives, investors, and policy-makers have come to Supernova for strategic insights on our increasingly interconnected world

Website: supernovahub.com

Strata NYC

September 19-21, NYC, NY
To say that big data is a big deal for government is an obvious understatement. Government, after all, has extraordinary amount of data, with much more becoming available as open data initiatives move forward. The first Strata Conference in February 2011 was a sold-out hit. Strata NYC will pull together global leaders in big data in the Big Apple.

Website: strataconf.com

Fedtalks 2011

October 12th, Washington, DC

Open government went to the theater at the first Fedtalks. In 2011, look for more federal government and industry experts to discuss the state of innovation in government.

Website: Fedscoop.com/fedtalks/fedtalks2011

GOSCON

October 2011, Portland, OR
If 2010 was a year where open government moved “beyond plans to practice,” by late 2011 there should be many more case studies of implementation. GOSCON – the government open source conference – will feature discussions and presentations about how government leaders, innovators and smart operations are using open source.

Website: goscon.org

Digital Capital Week

November 4 – November 11, Washington, DC

Last year, the inaugural Digital Capital Week showcased tech innovation in Washington. The 2011 version of Digital Capital Week bids to be even bigger.
Website: digitalcapitalweek.org

Web 2.0 Summit

November 15-17, San Francisco
This event brings together business leaders, big thinkers, and innovative technologists who are shaping the future of the Web. In 2011, it’s clear that the shape of that future matters for government and citizens alike.

Website: web2summit.com

Live townhall from Twitter HQ with US UN @AmbassadorRice [#AskAmbRice]

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Today at 1 PM EST, Susan Rice, United States Ambassador to the United Nations, participated in a live town hall on foreign policy. Archived video from the livestream is embedded below:

Here’s how Ambassador Rice described the digital town hall at the White House blog:

When I left the West Coast after college in 1986, only one in 500 Americans owned a cell phone – and these were essentially bricks about 10 inches long. IBM had just announced its first laptop, which weighed 12 pounds. The founders of Facebook, I can only imagine, were then figuring out how to master nap time and tee ball.

As I go back again this week to take part in a Twitter Town Hall in San Francisco, an event that will be carried live on Twitter and Ustream at 10:00 a.m. Pacific Time, the Bay Area looks quite a bit different. Education and innovation – “the currency of the 21st century,” in the words of President Obama – have changed the face of Silicon Valley and much of the world. But our interconnected age has also brought us new challenges. Today, transnational threats can sweep across borders as freely as a mass migration, an environmental calamity, or a deadly disease.

The Obama Administration is working every day to meet these challenges through our work at the United Nations, which plays an essential role as a keeper of peace, a provider of emergency aid, and a mediator between nations. You may agree – or disagree – with an approach to foreign policy that makes the best use of this complicated but indispensable institution. Whatever your views, I encourage you to send me your questions tomorrow at 10 a.m. Pacific Time on Twitter, using the hashtag, #AskAmbRice.

A snapshot of the conversation is featured using the Twitter search widget below.

new TWTR.Widget({
version: 2,
type: ‘search’,
search: ‘#AskAmbRice’,
interval: 6000,
title: ‘Ask’,
subject: ‘Ambassador Rice’,
width: ‘auto’,
height: 300,
theme: {
shell: {
background: ‘#0a1585’,
color: ‘#ffffff’
},
tweets: {
background: ‘#ffffff’,
color: ‘#444444’,
links: ‘#1985b5’
}
},
features: {
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loop: true,
live: true,
hashtags: true,
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Here’s the uStream social stream:

Live from the Newseum: Jobs and the Economy of the Future

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In February of 2011, the effects of the The Atlantic has released a special report on jobs and the economy. This morning, the report and the prospects for growth will be discussed at a digital town hall on at the Newseum, “Jobs and the Economy of the Future.

Guests include:

  • Timothy Geithner, Secretary of the Treasury
  • Julius Genachowski, Chairman, FCC
  • Sen. Orrin Hatch
  • Jon Huntsman, US Ambassador to China
  • Gov. Bob McDonnell, Virginia
  • Brian Deese, Deputy Director, NEC

    The event’s digital component includes a livestream and a new instance of Microsoft’s Town Hall platform for collecting feedback from the online audience. There is also an active backchannel on Twitter aggregated at the #USFutureEconomy hashtag:

    http://widgets.twimg.com/j/2/widget.js

    new TWTR.Widget({
    version: 2,
    type: ‘search’,
    search: ‘USFutureEconomy’,
    interval: 6000,
    title: ‘What is the discussion about the’,
    subject: ‘Jobs of the Future?’,
    width: ‘auto’,
    height: 300,
    theme: {
    shell: {
    background: ‘#004869’,
    color: ‘#ffffff’
    },
    tweets: {
    background: ‘#ffffff’,
    color: ‘#444444’,
    links: ‘#1985b5’
    }
    },
    features: {
    scrollbar: false,
    loop: true,
    live: true,
    hashtags: true,
    timestamp: true,
    avatars: true,
    toptweets: true,
    behavior: ‘default’
    }
    }).render().start();

    The Atlantic will be liveblogging the event as well.