Monthly Archives: March 2011

Looking back at SXSWi and a “Social Networking Bills of Rights”

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Posts and thoughts on the 2011 South by Southwest Interactive Festival are still making their way out of my hard drive. On the first day of the conference, I moderated a panel on “Social Network Users’ Bill of Rights” that has received continued interest in the press.This correspondent moderated a panel on a “social networking bill of rights” which has continued to receive attention in the days since the festival, including at MSNBC, Mainstreet.com, and PC World, focusing on the responsibility data stewardship. At MemeBurn.com, Alistair Fairweather highlighted a key question to consider for the technology industry to consider in the months ahead: “Why is user data always vested within the networks themselves? Why don’t we host our own data as independent “nodes”, and then allow networks access to it?”

Good questions, and ones that a few startups I talked to at the festival are working hard to answer. Stay tuned. For now, Jon Pincus captured the online conversation about the panel using Storify, below.

http://storify.com/jdp23/snubor-at-sxswi.js[View the story “#snubor at #sxswi” on Storify]

Samantha Power: Transparency has gone global

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Innovations in democratic governance have been and likely always will be a global phenomenon. Samantha Power, senior director and special assistant for multilateral affairs and human rights at the White house, highlighted the ways in which platforms and initiatives for transparency in other countries are growing on the White House blog yesterday.

While “Sunshine Week” may be an American invention, the momentum for greater transparency and accountability in government is a global phenomenon. In countries around the world, governments and civil society groups are taking new and creative steps to ensure that government delivers for citizens and to strengthen democratic accountability.

From Kenya to Brazil to France to Australia, new laws and platforms are giving citizens new means to ask for, demand or simply create greater government transparency. As Power observed, open government is taking root in India, where the passage of India’s Right to Information Act and new digital platforms have the potential to change the dynamic between citizens and the immense bureaucracy.

Power listed a series of global transparency efforts, often empowered by technology, that serve as other useful examples of “innovations in democratic governance” on every continent

  • El Salvador and Liberia recently passed progressive freedom of information laws, joining more than 80 countries with legislation in place, up from only 13 in 1990;
  • A few weeks ago in Paris, six new countries from Europe, Africa, Central Asia, and the Middle East met the high standards of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), empowering citizens with unprecedented information about payments made for the extraction of natural resources;
  • Brazil and South Africa are pioneering innovative tools to promote budget transparency and foster citizen engagement in budget decision-making, along with tens of other countries that are making budget proposals and processes open to public input and scrutiny;
  • Civil society groups are developing mechanisms to enable citizens to keep track of what happens in legislatures and parliaments, including impressive web portals such as votainteligente.cl in Chile and mzalendo.com in Kenya; and
  • Experiments in citizen engagement in Tanzania, Indonesia, and the Philippines, are demonstrating that citizen efforts to monitor the disbursement of government funds for education, health, and other basic services, actually decrease the likelihood of corruption and drive better performance in service delivery.

There’s a long road ahead for open government here in the United States. While improving collaboration and transparency through open government will continue to be difficult nuts to crack, it looks like “Uncle Sam” could stand to learn a thing or two from the efforts and successes of other countries on transparency. Addressing FOIA reform and better mobile access to information are two places to start.

For more on how open government can have a global impact, click on over to this exclusive interview with Samantha Power on national security, transparency and open government.

National Archives hosts Open Government R&D Summit

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Whether the White House can foster innovation through open government is up for debate. Last December, the President’s Council of Advisers on Science and Technology (PCAST) emphasized the importance of establishing an R&D agenda for open government in a report.

This week in Washington, D.C., the National Archives is hosting an Open Government Research and Development Summit. Collaborative innovation in open government is a notion that goes back to Thomas Jefferson. Whether open models for science can lead to better outcomes in research in the 21st Century is the question of the day. You can follow the liveblog of the event below.

Day 2 Liveblog

Day 1 Liveblog

For more details, here are the organizing notes:

The summit will set the foundation for a robust R&D agenda that ensures the benefits of open government are widely realized, with emphasis on how open government can spur economic growth and improve the lives of everyday Americans. This will be the first opportunity for researchers, scholars, and open government professionals to begin a discussion that will continue at academic centers throughout the country over the next few years.”

Government innovators will talk about openness in the context of education, health, and economic policy, and international open government. Speakers include Aneesh Chopra, U.S. Chief Technology Officer, Todd Park, Chief Technology Officer of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and David Ferriero, Archivist of the United States.

Panelists made up of scholars, activists, and present and former policymakers will then discuss the important research questions that researchers must grapple with in order to ensure lasting success in the open government space. Panels will discuss issues such as how to safely release data without creating mosaic effects. Panelists include Jim Hendler (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute), Noshir Contractor (Northwestern University), Archon Fung (Harvard University), Chris Vein (U.S. Deputy Chief Technology Officer), Beth Noveck (New York Law School), and Susan Crawford (Yeshiva University).

The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) and Networking and Information Technology Research and Development (NITRD) are hosting this summit, with support from the MacArthur Foundation.

Workshop agenda: click here
Participant Information Packet: click here

Video of federal chief technology officer Aneesh Chopra is embedded below. [Editor’s Note: Apparently the way that iPhone 4 accelerometer interacted with the video meant that the video didn’t shift to landscape mode after the shift. Apologies to viewers, who may find this one better to listen to, unless you prefer to put the laptop or screen on edge.]

Part II:

Vint Cerf talks to the CFR about Internet freedom and foreign policy

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In a new video interview from the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), Google’s Internet evangelist, Vint Cerf talks with CFR’s Hagit Bachrach about the future of the Internet and what that could mean for international development and foreign policy. He spoke about the importance of an “Internet without borders” last year.

Earlier in the month, Cerf spoke with USAID’s Alex O. Dehgan about technology as a tool for foreign policy, discussing the ability of science and information technology to connect political leaders, diplomats and innovators around the globe.

Last year, Cerf made it clear that he believed that governments shouldn’t control the Web, at least with respect to the governance of ICANN, the organization that has responsibility for the Internet domain system. In the wake of the Internet shutdown in Egypt and ongoing online censorship around the globe, that perspective has gained more prominence.

OMB Watch finds progress on open government, long road ahead

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As Sunshine Week comes to a close in Washington, OpenTheGovernment.org is hosting an event at the Center for American Progress on the Road forward for open government. Here’s the context for the event:

Two years ago President Obama committed his Administration “to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government.” Toward this end, the Administration has issued policy changes: a new Memorandum on Freedom of Information Act and Attorney General Guidelines, a new Executive Order (EO) on Classified National Security Information, and a new EO on Controlled Unclassified Information. To help meet the goal of embedding openness in the government, the Administration also has taken steps to make information more available and usable by the public, including setting up Data.gov andrequiring agencies to draw up plans to hard-wire openness into the way the government operates. Agencies have taken up the challenge, but more needs to be done.

Transparency experts from inside and outside of the federal government government are focusing upon how initiatives are being put into practice and what the next steps will be. You can watch the event live online at CAP or at OpenTheGovernment.org.

OMBWatch is presenting findings from a new report on assessing progress towards a 21st century right to know, embedded below:

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The first panel, with David S. Ferriero, Archivist of the United States, Steven P. Croley, Special Assistant to the President for Justice and Regulatory Policy, White House Domestic Policy Council, and Gary Bass, Executive Director, OMB Watch, is focused upon the policy aspects of the Obama administration’s Open Government Initiative.

The second panel is focused upon the role technology plays in the way people get and use information, how the government is trying to fill that need, and the strengths and limitations of the Administration’s approach. Panelists include Jennifer LaFleur, Director of Computer-Assisted Reporting at ProPublica ; Tom Lee, Director of Sunlight Labs at the Sunlight Foundation; and Sheila Krumholz, Executive Director of the Center for Responsive Politics, and Todd Park, Chief Technology Officer, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

The US CIO goes to the white board to describe good government

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Earlier this week, United States CIO Vivek Kundra turned to the White House whiteboard to talk about sunshine, savings and service. If you’re unfamiliar with Kundra, he’s the man who has proposed and now is entrusted with implementing sweeping federal IT reform. One of the tools he’s been applying to the task is the so-called IT dashboard, which helps the White House Office of Management and Budget, where he serves to track IT spending. He claims to have reduced federal IT spending by some $3 billion dollars over the past two years with increased tracking and scrutiny.The federal CIO explains more about the results from that work, below.

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

UPDATE: As open data consultant Dan Morgan pointed out, however, the Government Accountability Office reported that while OMB has made improvements to its dashboard, “further work is needed by agencies and OMB to ensure data accuracy.”

…inaccuracies can be attributed to weaknesses in how agencies report data to the Dashboard, such as providing erroneous data submissions, as well as limitations in how OMB calculates the ratings. Until the selected agencies and OMB resolve these issues, ratings will continue to often be inaccurate and may not reflect current program performance. GAO is recommending that selected agencies take steps to improve the accuracy and reliability of Dashboard information and OMB improve how it rates investments relative to current performance and schedule variance. Agencies generally concurred with the recommendations; OMB did not concur with the first recommendation but concurred with the second. GAO maintains that until OMB implements both, performance may continue to be inaccurately represented on the Dashboard.

One question left unanswered: Is /good the new /open? Decide for yourself at the new “Good Government” section at WhiteHouse.gov.

Improving open government oversight through FOIA reform

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The Freedom of Information Act is one of the primary levers by which journalists, government watchdogs and other organizations can hold the United States government accountable. Today in Washington, the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Oversight and Government Reform held a hearing on “The Freedom of Information Act: Crowd-Sourcing Government Oversight.
Full House Oversight and Reform Committee

The testimony of the witnesses made it clear that major issues persist with the cost, mechanism and compliance with FOIA requests made to government agencies.

Public information should be online in real time, said Representative Darrell Issa (R-CA) (@DarrellIssa), chairman of the committee.

His prepared statement provided context for the focus of the hearing:

The Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”) is one of the most important tools for government transparency and accountability. It permits the private-sector, the media, watchdog groups, and the general public to scrutinize the activities of federal agencies – from the telephone logs and email correspondence of federal employees to internal memoranda, transcripts, and meeting minutes.

Minus a few specific exemptions designed to protect narrowly-defined privacy concerns, national security and law enforcement matters, claims of executive privilege and trade secrets, information about the government’s work is required by law to be publicly accessible. Indeed, every federal agency, commission, department and corporation – as well as the White House itself – falls under FOIA’s expansive authority.

Representative Elijah Cummings (D-MD) defended the record of the Obama administration on open government and quoted President James Madison in his opening statement:

A popular government without popular information or the means of acquiring it, is but a prologue to a farce, or a tragedy, or perhaps both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance, , and a people who mean to be their own governors, must arm themselve with the power knowledge gives.”

Rep. Cummings introduced a new bill today, entitled the “Transparency and Openness in Government Act.” (As of the time this post went live, it was not in Thomas.gov yet.) According to Rep. Cummings, the bill would make federal commissions more transparent, increase access to records, ensure government email records were preserved and improve GAO access to govt records. The legislation includes five bills that passed the House during the 111th Congress:

  • The Federal Advisory Committee Act requires agencies to disclose more information about advisory committees and closes existing loopholes;
  • The Presidential Records Act increases public access to White House records by establishing statutory procedures prior to FOIA releases;
  • The Presidential Libraries Donation Reform Act mandates greater public disclosure of library donor information;
  • The Electronic Message Preservation Act modernizesthe Federal Records Act and the Presidential Records Act to ensure that White House and agency e-mail records are preserved;
  • The GAO Improvement Act strengthens the authority of the Government Accountability Office to access agency records.

Transparency shouldn’t be a partisan issue, emphasized Cummings.

Miriam Nisbit of OGIS

The committee heard from a distinguished panel of witnesses, including Miriam Nesbit, the director of the Office of Government Information Services (OGIS) at the National Archives and Records Administration. OGIS opened in September 2009 and acts as an ombudsman for FOIA request. “OGIS encourages a more collaborative, accessible FOIA for everyone,” said Nisbet.

While both witnesses and congressmen recognized that the Department of Justice launched FOIA.gov at the outset of Sunshine Week, “there is the awkward fact the Justice Department’s own FOIA backlog has not been reduced in the past year,” observed Daniel Metcalfe, executive director of Collaboration on Government Secrecy.

The costs of FOIA are part of that story. “In 2010, agencies reported nearly $400 million to process FOIA requests,” testified Rick Blum of SunshineInGovernment.org.

There’s also the issue of agencies and officials claimed exemptions to requests. Blum noted that for Sunshine Week, ProPublica created a searchable database of FOIA exemptions.

These claimed exemptions extend to the White House. Tom Fitton of Judicial Watch challenged the Secret Services’ contention that visitor logs are not subject to FOIA.

While the Project of Government Oversight’s Angela Canterbury gave the administration credit for proactive information release at USASpending.gov, Data.gov, Recovery.gov and FOIA.gov, she acknowledged that “if FOIA is the yardstick for openness, then we haven’t gotten very far yet.”

The issue lies is in the default towards secrecy versus openness. “Too often, overt secrecy has not only impaired the promise of FOIA but also has put the American people at risk,” said Canterbury.

That said, Daniel Metcalfe did offer recognition of President Obama’s elevation of open government in his administration, including a speech at the United Nations where openness was highlighted in an “unprecedented” way.

The written testimony of the witnesses is linked below. Video of the hearing will be available through the tireless efforts of citizen archivist Carl Malamud at House.Resource.org later in the week.

Ghonim: Egypt launches first official website that uses open source

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The Supreme Judicial Commission has put up a new website in Egypt that offers its citizens the ability to read amendments to its constitution. Referendum.eg offers information about voting and the rights and duties of citizens.

Notably, the site is buit upon an open source content management system, Joomla. Wael Ghonim, the Google employee who played a role in Egypt’s revolution, shared the news on Tuesday.

Pew: More than half of US adults went online to get election news in 2010

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The Pew Internet and Life Project released new research today on the Internet and Campaign 2010 that 73% of adult internet users went online to get news, information or otherwise be involved in last year’s elections. That represents some 54% of all US adults, or a majority of the population, now are turning to the Internet when election season comes around. Expect that to grow further in the presidential season next year.

“As the Internet has developed as a tool for political engagement and information-seeking, the audience for online political content has also changed,” said Aaron Smith, Pew Internet senior research specialist in a prepared statement. Smith authored the report. “These online spaces are a meeting place where politically engaged Americans of all stripes—young and old, conservative and liberal—can come to catch up on the latest events, share their thoughts on the political news of the day, and see what their friends have to say about the issues that are important to them.”

Online

Mainstream media websites occupy the top 5 spots in the list of the main sources of news cited by respondents, next to Yahoo and Google. Only 2% of those surveyed said that they visited a candidate’s website, setting a low bar for that number to explode in the 2012 cycle as both incumbents and those wishing to oust them turn to the Web to “go direct” to citizens.

For some, where they’re visiting is a little less clear. 29% of those surveyed chose “other” for their main sources of news, which could mean any number of sources in the blogosphere or the rest of the Internet.

http://widget.icharts.net

Social

Social networking is an increasingly important factor in American consumption of political news. According to eMarketer, in 2011 half of all US Internet users log in monthly to Facebook.

There are now well over than tens of million American Twitter users, though a small percentage of those users account for the bulk of the tweets. According to Pew, one in five online adults (22%) used Twitter or a social networking site for political purposes in 2010. Twitter has some 200 million users worldwide, approximately 60 million of them of which are in the United States.

Video

With more broadband access, Internet-connected flatscreen televisions, set-top boxes and an explosion of video-capable smartphones and tablets, people are also watching in more places, spaces and times than ever before. Timeshifting stopped being a science fiction phenomenon years ago with the introduction of digital video recorders, familiar now as “DVRs”, but on-demand video from Apple, Amazon, YouTube, Netflix and a host of other sites are available to those able to pay the toll for broadband Internet access.

http://widget.icharts.net

Polarized?

According to the report, some “55% of all internet users feel that the internet increases the influence of those with extreme political views, compared with 30% who say that the internet reduces the influence of those with extreme views by giving ordinary citizens a chance to be heard.”

Is the Internet polarizing? Micah Sifry of techPresident wasn’t so sure.

This could be true, or it could be a false positive. What if people are conflating things? Arguably politics in America is more polarized, but cable TV and talk radio and paid negative political advertising are driving that shift, while the Internet is just an overall disruptive force that is enabling lots of more people to speak up and connect with the like-minded and unlike-minded alike.

Groups

Polarization can express itself in how people group online and offline. As with so many activities online, political information gathering online requires news consumers to be more digitally literate.

In 2011, that may mean recognizing the potential for digital echo chambers, where unaware citizens become trapped in a filter bubble created by rapidly increasing personalization in search, commercial and social utilities like Google, Amazon and Facebook.

Pew’s research found that some of the people surveyed at least recognized the complexity of the political landscape online. With a few clicks of the mouse, keystrokes or finger taps, a news consumer can find the best and worst of humanity is mirrored online. The open platform of the Internet allows extremist views to co-exists alongside moderate perspectives. It also provides means for like-minded citizens to find one another, using the Internet as a platform for collective action.

http://widget.icharts.net

While the diversity of sources may have radically expanded and the delivery systems for them may have multiplied, finding and establishing the truth of what’s out there can be be challenging.

Caveat lector.

You can download the full report as a PDF here. For digital politicos, it’s a must read.

At the @NASATweetup, @Astro_Wheels shares the view from space

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http://storify.com/digiphile/nasa-tweetup-with-astrowheels-shares-the-view-from.js