Off to Gov2.0 !

[Allan T.]

Urban Mashers,

I'm off to Gov2.0 Summit next week in DC to get inspired about the
idea of "Government as a platform" and how we can use data as a
jumping off point for new collaborations between public sector,
private sector, and individual citizens.

Please let me know any particular ideas, memes, or projects you'd like
me to tap into or report back on while I'm there. Here is the
schedule:

http://www.gov2summit.com/public/schedule/grid

And this call to action/definition piece by Tim O'Reilly on Government
as a Platform is really worth a read (must admit, I'm a bit of a
fanboy):

http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/09/04/gov-20-its-all-about-the-platform/

Best, Allan

[Matt Gillooly]

That's awesome, Allan. I'm looking forward to hearing all about it
later.

Off the top of my head, one potential trend I'd keep an eye out for is
the intersection of crowdsourcing/open-source and government as a
platform. I think the first wave of government 2.0 has rightfully
been about opening up what data various government agencies already
have. My hunch is that the second wave will combine that with a
higher degree of citizen involvement... something a little bit more
"by the people, and for the people" if you catch my drift. I'd be
very interested to see if you come across anything that supports or
goes against that guess.

Have an awesome time. Should be a lot of interesting folks with neat
projects there.

cheers,
Matt

[Matt Gillooly]

Ha! I guess I'm late to the party. Just read the Tim O'Reilly
article, and he makes the same point, but much better, towards the end
(starting with the Meetup.com paragraphs).

[Allan Tear]

Great Open City data initiatives, apps & examples here. A quick
rundown:

San Francisco BART and the iBart application
Open311.org - collaborative effort to create an open standard for 311
services
openplan.org
NeighborsForNeighbors - finally a neighbor-centric social
collaboration platform that seems to have critical mass. 36K uniques a
month for Boston neighborhoods.
InnovationGeo - AreYouSafe, a handheld geiger counter for crime
datamasher.org - oriented at data.gov, but very cool idea to make
mashups accessible to all