[okfn-discuss] New O'Reilly "Open Government" book

Tue Feb 23 17:44:14 UTC 2010

This might be of interest!

---------- Forwarded message ----------

Open Government: Collaboration, Transparency, and Participation in
Practice--New from O'Reilly Media

If government is a platform, and Gov 2.0 is the next release, how can
we make it one that shakes up--and reshapes--the world? A timely new
book from O'Reilly, "Open Government" (O'Reilly Media, $44.99 USD),
answers that question.

(I-Newswire) February 22, 2010 -
 For Immediate Release
For more information, please contact:
Sara Peyton (707) 827-7118 or peyton at oreilly.com

Open Government: Collaboration, Transparency, and Participation in
Practice--New from O'Reilly
Opening Up Government and Making It Work

Sebastopol, CA--The Obama presidential campaign was historic for many
reasons, including its unprecedented use of the Internet and Web 2.0
technologies. Transparency and open government are two primary issues
of this administration and we see technology playing an integral part
of it, especially with the appointment of the country's very first CIO
and CTO.

The concept of open government has been influenced--for the better--by
the open source software movement. Indeed, if government is a
platform, and Gov 2.0 is the next release, how can we make it one that
shakes up--and reshapes--the world?

Fortunately, in a timely new book from O'Reilly, "Open Government"
(O'Reilly Media, $44.99 USD), Beth Simone Noveck, U.S. Deputy Chief
Technology Officer for open government, and Tim O'Reilly, founder and
CEO of O'Reilly Media, along with dozens of leading visionaries and
practitioners both inside and outside of government attempt to answer
that question. In the new book, they share their ideas on how to
achieve and direct this emerging world of online collaboration,
transparency, and participation.

"Government 2.0 is the use of technology--especially the collaborative
technologies at the heart of Web 2.0--to better solve collective
problems at a city, state, national, and international level," writes
O'Reilly in his essay, "Defining Government 2.0: Lessons Learned from
the Success of Computer Platforms." "The hope is that Internet
technologies will allow us to rebuild the kind of participatory
government envisioned by our nation's founders, in which, as Thomas
Jefferson wrote in a letter to Joseph Cabell, 'every man…feels that he
is a participator in the government of affairs, not merely at an
election one day in the year, but every day.'"

All these contributors and more offer practical solutions as we step
into the future:

- Beth Simone Noveck, U.S. Deputy Chief Technology Officer for open
government, "The Single Point of Failure"
- Jerry Brito, senior research fellow at the Mercatus Center at George
Mason University, "All Your Data Are Belong to Us: Liberating
Government Data"
- Aaron Swartz, cofounder of reddit.com, OpenLibrary.org, and
BoldProgressives.org, "When Is Transparency Useful?"
- Ellen S. Miller, executive director of the Sunlight Foundation,
"Disrupting Washington's Golden Rule"
- Carl Malamud, founder of Public.Resource.Org, "By the People"
- Douglas Schuler, president of the Public Sphere Project, "Online
Deliberation and Civic Intelligence"
- Howard Dierking, program manager on Microsoft's MSDN and TechNet Web
platform team, "Engineering Good Government"
- Matthew Burton, Web entrepreneur and former intelligence analyst at
the Defense Intelligence Agency, "A Peace Corps for Programmers"
- Gary D. Bass and Sean Moulton, OMB Watch, "Bringing the Web 2.0
Revolution to Government"
- Tim O'Reilly, founder and CEO of O'Reilly Media, "Defining
Government 2.0: Lessons Learned from the Success of Computer
Platforms"

[READ MORE]

WHTM ABC27 Harrisburg (PA)

Critics Maintain Thompson Isn't Transparent

02/22/10 7:00 pm   |   reporter: Dennis Owens   producer: Myles Snyder

Harrisburg, Pa. - President Barack Obama (web | news | bio) is
promising transparency in the federal health care debate. State
lawmakers gave us the Right-to-Know Law to access more information
than ever before. And during her candidacy, Mayor Linda Thompson
promised transparency in city government. Some complain she's not
delivering

Transparency means to make visible by allowing light. Lots of
politicians these days promise transparency.

Harrisburg City Controller Dan Miller promises to deliver it this week
when he unveils a Web site that will show taxpayers where every one of
their tax dollars is going.

"For example, if we paid Dennis Owens any money last year, you could
look it up and see if Dennis Owens got paid from the city," said
Miller. "You didn't. I don't know that, but you could find that out."

Miller calls transparency an important check and balance.

"It's the people's business, and the people have a right to know," he said.

But critics of Mayor Thompson insist her administration is not
transparent. And they cite a few examples:

- A deal to appraise city assets was given to RSR Realty, whose owner
sat on the board of Thompson's non-profit organization Loveship and
contributed to her campaign. Though the financial terms for the
appraisal work haven't been finalized or approved by city council, RSR
has started the work.

- abc27 sources tell us that Rhoads & Sinon law firm will get school
district business. Rhoads & Sinon is the law firm of James Ellison,
Thompson's campaign manager and head of the Harrisburg Authority.

- A directive to school district Superintendent Gerald Kohn not to
talk to anyone, especially the press, about school district business.
This could hinder the district's fund raising.

[READ MORE]If you show more about what you're doing, people trust you
more. Maybe that's obvious, but now we have some results along those
lines for Federal sites. The deal is that we now have an
Administration...

KTUL News Channel 8 Oklahoma City (OK)

Committee Approves Bills To Streamline Operations

Oklahoma City - A pair of bills designed to streamline government
operations and provide more transparency on state spending have
cleared a House panel.

The bills passed unanimously Monday through the House Government
Modernization Committee. One bill by Rep. Ken Miller would require the
state to post more information on state expenditures to a state Web
site, including all purchases and individual expenses.

Another bill by Rep. Jason Murphey directs the Office of State Finance
to develop a plan to consolidate the financial services of all state
agencies.

Under the bill, payroll, purchasing, accounts payable and accounts
receivable functions ultimately would be transferred to the Office of
State Finance. The agency projects more than $2 million in potential
savings under the plan.

Saint Petersburg Times (FL)

John Thrasher works to shield party credit cards from public view

So before a conflict of interest could arise, St. Augustine Sen. John
Thrasher stepped down from chairman of the Senate Ethics and Elections
Committee when he was chosen as the head of the Republican Party of
Florida this Saturday.

But three days before he left the Senate post, Thrasher presided over
the committee when it gave RPOF (and anyone else with a political
credit card) a nice fat gift: A clear exemption from having to report
"a copy of each credit card statement which shall be included in the
next [campaign finance]report..." [paren mine].

That language actually exists in statute. Thrasher's committee bill
strikes it out.

But it was already nullified by a curious 2005 Division of Elections
opinion that essentially said "each credit card statement" didn't need
to be "included" because it would be too difficult to include the
statements via the state's electronic campaign-finance filing system.
Apparently, the government system didn't have a function to accept
PDFs. Yeah, PDFs are so hard to post.

Like this one: Download De0507.

[READ MORE]

The Illinois Review (IL)

Andrzejewski to Spearhead Forensic Audit at Illinois Secretary of State

from the Enriquez campaign

February 21, 2010, AURORA - Robert Enriquez, Republican candidate for
Illinois Secretary of  State, announced today that Adam Andrzejewski
would lead the forensic audit of the Illinois  Secretary of State’s
office after victory in the November general election.

[READ MORE]

The Statesman Journal (OR)

Open government vital for accountability

Plan to boost transparency will benefit all Oregonians

February 23, 2010

Previous Page

Mention the topic of open meetings and open records to some folks, and
you'll be greeted with a yawn at best and a snore at worst. But it's a
topic that gives journalists goosebumps.

And frankly, it's a subject that should stir every Oregonian: We are a
people committed to public debate and dialogue.

So why do we allow so much of government to take place behind closed doors?

Oregon Attorney General John Kroger wants to change that. He has
launched a statewide initiative to improve government transparency.

Kroger and the Oregon Newspaper Publishers Association are hosting six
public meetings to identify weaknesses in Oregon's open-government
practices. The first forum is Wednesday evening at the Salem Public
Library.

Journalists are passionate about open government.

In recent months, public-records laws have enabled the Statesman
Journal to get information relating to investigations of state
officials and agencies. Public meetings and records have enabled
reporters and editorial writers to witness the scandal at the
Willamette Education Service District as it unfolded.

[READ MORE]

--
Jonathan Gray

Community Coordinator
The Open Knowledge Foundation
http://blog.okfn.org

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