Great “Connected Empowerment” video featuring San Francisco Chief Innovation Officer Jay Nath and civic action platform, Neighborland.
How to join (or start) a civic tech movement where you live
For those of you interested in starting or joining the civic technology movement where you live, watch Code for America Brigade program director Kevin Curry discuss how designers and developers are doing just this everywhere across the United States.
How Palo Alto is leading the digital city movement
Palo Alto, Calif., Chief Information Officer Jonathan Reichental discusses his “digital city” vision, including how he leveraged the local developer community to help build city applications, bringing a “hacker ethic” to bureaucracy and the importance of supportive leaders in managing IT and cultural change.
Instead of butting heads, citizens and government can start mixing minds
MindMixer is working with the San Francisco, Los Angeles and other local communities to help crowdsource ideas for civic improvement. CEO and Co-Founder Nick Bowden discusses his venture and the value of government-citizen collaboration.
CivicSponsor helps citizens crowdfund their public spaces
CivicSponsor wants to disrupt the traditional way we fund our public spaces. Here, its three co-founders outline how their new venture aims to help citizens and public servants think outside the taxpayer box.
Voter ID and Civic Innovation
Since 2008, there has been a wave of voting law changes that impose barriers to the ballot box. Georgia Rep. John Lewis, a veteran of “Bloody Sunday,” called the new laws “the most concerted effort to restrict the right to vote since before the Voting Rights Act.”
The right to vote is being chiseled away by voter ID laws that require voters to show government-issued photo ID in order to vote.
In December, the Department of Justice blocked South Carolina’s voter ID law on the grounds it would make it harder for minorities to vote in violation of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act. Mississippi and Texas voting ID laws also must be pre-cleared but Texas is not waiting. The Lone Star State filed a federal lawsuit in an effort to speed up a decision.
Strict photo ID requirements will be in place in at least five states – Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Tennessee and Wisconsin — In November. With Election Day less than nine months away, voters without an official photo ID cannot wait for the challenges to play out at the Justice Department and in the courts.
In Wisconsin, for instance, voters must navigate “The 4 Proofs.”
I am a founding member of the Election Protection Coalition. Still, looking at the infographic makes my head hurt. More worrisome, it discourages voters from completing the application process. So I presented the problem of TMI (read: disenfranchisement by design) at Random Hacks of Kindness and the Hackathon for Social Good. Citizen programmers developed solutions to quickly provide voters with information on how to get a voter ID.
During Social Week Washington, DC, I gave a demo of the Cost of Freedom web-based app developed by Kin Lane, API Evangelist for CityGrid.
Users in Wisconsin can forget about “The 4 Proofs.” Instead, in four clicks or less, they will be able to access information about the state’s voter ID requirements, how to obtain a certified copy of their birth certificate (the document that’s typically produced to establish one’s identity), and the location, hours and directions to the Office of Vital Records using public transit.
I also gave a live demo of the Cost of Freedom text-based app developed by Jack Aboutboul, Twilio’s API Evangelist. Twilio is making an in-contribution of text message services to promote voter education.
To commemorate the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., we plan to launch the Cost of Freedom App on April 4, 2012.
I will post regular updates about the Cost of Freedom Project and other initiatives that are using civic innovation to protect the right to vote. The conversation about voter ID also gives us an opportunity to raise awareness about disruptive technologies in the public sector beyond election administration.
For more information, please visit us at Facebook.com/CostofFreedom. You can sign up to receive notice when the Cost of Freedom App is launched. Continue reading
2011 GovFresh Awards entries and voting now open
Every day, tech-minded citizens across the country are doing good by their communities, literally geeking out about how they can help re-define the relationship government has with its citizens, using technology as a democratic tool to empower both.
Bloomberg: How cities can ‘Moneyball’ government
New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg has a blog post on how cities are collaborating to better leverage data analytics and maximize taxpayer return on investment. The post cites examples from major American cities and how they’ve leveraged data, especially 311 logs, to realize efficiencies.
13 ways citizen developers are coding a better America
Code for America has published videos of CfA Fellows demoing their apps during the Code for America Summit held October 13-14 in San Francisco.
Citizen 2.0 white paper highlights 17 examples of government social media innovation
Switzerland-based RedCut has released Citizen 2.0, a white paper of case studies that include 17 examples of social media and government innovation. We asked CEO Hadi Barkat to share his methodology and what he learned.
Is AOL-Huffington Post making a gov 2.0 play?
Huffington Post Media Group, owned by AOL, announced it has purchased civic platform Localocracy for “under $1 million,” according to AllThingsD.
Here comes the Neighborland
Neighborland is a new ideation crowdsourcing startup that gives citizens a “fun and easy way for residents to suggest new businesses and services that they want in their neighborhood.”
The 411 on the 311: Q&A with Commons founder Suzanne Kirkpatrick
We asked new 311 iPhone app Commons co-founder Suzanne Kirkpatrick to share her thoughts on the new venture, 311 and trends in open government and Gov 2.0.
Building the ‘Next Generation Democracy’
I’ve been meaning to post something about Next Generation Democracy: What the Open-Source Revolution Means for Power, Politics, and Change for a long time now, but just haven’t had the time.
A proactive snow strategy for Cory Booker and other elected officials
There’s no question Newark Mayor Cory Booker deserves the accolades he’s received for responding to constituent needs during the recent blizzard that hit the East Coast. It’s inspiring to see a politician step out from behind the desk and photo opps to do something tangible and meaningful where people can witness it firsthand. Who doesn’t love a diaper-delivering mayor?
Manor CIO Haisler joins Spigit as Director of Government Innovation
Manor, TX, Chief Information Officer Dustin Haisler has joined idea crowd-sourcing start-up Spigit as Director of Government Innovation. Here’s a few questions we had for him when he broke the news to us.
Crowdsourcing, ideas and innovation in government
Join Gov 2.0 Radio producer Adriel Hampton for a conversation with IdeaScale co-founder Rob Hoehn. In the fourth of our series on crowdsourcing, innovation and ideation in the government and enterprise, Rob talks about how business clients are learning from the government, being SaaS before the cloud was cool, and what his company learned about Section 508 while working to help implement the U.S. Open Government Directive.
[audio:http://www.blogtalkradio.com/gov20/2010/09/06/government-20-radio.mp3]Getting the BrightIdea: Crowdsourcing in government and enterprise
Gov 2.0 Radio talks with Matt Greeley of BrightIdea. BrightIdea has powered innovation campaigns for the government of Ireland, City of San Francisco and has a new contract with the U.S. State Department. It’s also the platform behind the $200 million GE Ecomagination Challenge. We talk with company co-founder Matt Greeley about challenges and best practices in ideation, innovation and crowdsourcing for government and enterprise.
Government ideation and innovation
Gov 2.0 Radio talks with Hutch Carpenter of Spigit about engaging internal and external stakeholders in the ideation process using Web tools and game mechanics.
Leveraging your community through crowdsourcing
Richard White on Leveraging Your Community: San Francisco startup UserVoice allows governments, politicians, nonprofits and businesses small and large to harness the ideas and feedback of their employees, communities and citizens online. Gov 2.0 Radio host Adriel Hampton talks with CEO Richard White about best practices for local government use of this kind of feedback tool, and some of the best and worst examples of the platform in action.
FedSpace wants your ideas
Spigit launches CitizenSpigit, government crowdsourcing, engagement platform
Idea management software developer Spigit announced the launch of CitizenSpigit, ‘a platform that enables government agencies to engage citizens and employees to improve efficiency and operations, as well as to generate actionable ideas.’ The City of Manor, Texas, is the first municipality to deploy the platform, which it uses to power Manor Labs.
SF selects Brightidea to power employee ideas campaign
San Francisco has selected Brightidea to power its new idea platform aimed to foster ideas from the city’s 26,000 employees. The site is located at ImproveSF.org.
The top idea will be selected for implementation with 10 other high ranking ideas recognized in an event with Mayor Gavin Newsom and get featured on SFGov.org as well as the city’s Facebook page.
How to pick a citizen idea platform
Today, more than ever, there has been lots of talk about open innovation, idea collection, ideation and many other terms used to describe the collection of citizen feedback. Most idea collection platforms have been lumped together and only compared on the basis of price alone. Based upon our research at Manor Labs, in collaboration with the Persuasive Technology Lab at Stanford University, we have come to the conclusion that there are two distinctly different platforms for idea collection.
5 more sites crowdsourcing ideas for government
Here are 5 more sites crowdsourcing citizen ideas to improve the way government works. See also 6 government sites crowdsourcing citizen ideas.
6 government sites crowdsourcing citizen ideas
Local governments and federal agencies are leveraging crowdsourcing feedback tools such as UserVoice to gauge citizen feedback. Here are 6 examples.
What other agencies are doing the same?