K Street Cafe

Open Government: Idling in the Driveway (Sunlight Foundation)
Earlier last week as part of the Open Government Directive, the rubber was supposed to hit the road with respect to agencies releasing data. Unfortunately, some agencies avoided the requirement altogether, while others simply stated that  a plan on how to identify and release data would be created. 

Mobile App Developers Tackle Africa’s Biggest Problems (CNN)
Mobile app developers are sprouting in Africa to help tackle some of its biggest problems, many creating applications that can be used with phone text messages.

This weekend, nearly 300 top transparency and open government experts from non-profit, technology developer, and government staff communities gathered at George Washington University to attend the Sunlight Foundation’s Transparency Camp 2010. The purpose of this second annual “unconference” was to clarify the needs for making government transparent, both from a philosophical and a how-to perspective.

As with all of these self-organizing, “barcamp-style” unconferences, participants are actively tweeting their thoughts throughout the sessions. The depth of these sessions and Twitter discussions is such that this article cannot adequately cover them. Thankfully, the tweet-stream is available online here (or you can follow the hashtags #TCamp2010 and #TCamp10 yourself).

Some of the key points raised in sessions include:

1. Making government data accessible in online, machine-readable format is essential.

2. Transparency is essential to improve trust in government by making it more accountable.

3. Transparency is a long-term need, so building a strong foundation to ensure it continues to develop is essential.

4. Building a foundation for transparency means we cannot use as a short-term success metric how many people use what we are building now (that audience will grow over time).

5. Digital divide issues remain important and they are building universal broadband network, getting computers and mobile devices into the hands of underserved communities, training them on how to use these tools, and developing a culture that encourages people to use these resources.

The conversation will continue on Twitter and elsewhere, so book mark the Tweetstream link, follow along, and add your thoughts.

President Barack Obama’s commitment to transparency and open government has resulted in a surprising response from conservatives — many of whom are trying to outdo the White House with their own efforts to engage the citizenry.

The top two leaders of House Republicans, Reps. John Boehner (Ohio) and Eric Cantor (Va.), have appealed directly to Americans as the first policy battle of Obama’s administration takes shape.

The week before Obama took office, Cantor held a hearing on Capitol Hill that featured four video questions from citizens about the economic stimulus. The hearing had a similar feel to the YouTube debates during the presidential primaries. Boehner, meanwhile, invited users to ask questions on Digg. Nearly 1,500 were submitted, and Boehner answered the top questions on CNN. (more…)

The K Street Café editors posited this thoughtful question to its contributors this week: How should advocacy organizations adapt to stay relevant in the changing paradigm of constituent engagement with Congress and the Administration that largely removes the need for any sort of intermediary presence?

The idea behind the question is that the government becomes SO transparent and easy to interact with that professional associations, nonprofits, and (gasp!) advocacy vendors become obsolete. My reaction is three-fold: 1) Add value to the raw data of government; 2) Provide expertise for interacting with government online; 3) Continue to use the aggregate power inherent in organizing.

(more…)