“It Takes A Village”
During a camping trip in the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains my friends and I talked about our childhoods while walking through the wilderness. When I was a child, my friends and I would play outside all day on Saturday. When we needed something (usually food), we would just go to a friend’s house nearby. It was nice to have several “home bases” to get what we needed for our mission of the day. I liked stopping by Steve’s home the most. His mom made the best peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. These amazing BP&J sandwiches were made with loving hands and had just the right amount of my favorite peanut butter and jelly. She would cut these tasty sandwiches into triangles of delicious goodness and I would savor every bite. The recipe is pretty simple, but there was something magical about how Steve’s mom put it together. Our neighborhood was more like a village where everyone pitched in to help keep the community healthy. productive, and strong, as in “It Takes a Village” ~Hillary Rodham Clinton. United States Secretary of State
Gov 2.0 Peanut Butter & Jelly Time
There is something magic about Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwiches. Anyone can make a Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwich and the ingredients are readily available. This is similar to Government 2.0 Apps, anyone can make one and the ingredients are readily available. Examples of this can be seen at Code for America. Their Data Camps are attracting people from all walks of life that are interested in improving the neighborhoods and cities in which they live. New apps, widgets, and gadgets were created from http://data.seattle.gov and can be reviewed at “Data Camp Seattle: Northwest Gov 2.0 Geeks Make it Look Easy“. These type of events are happening all around the country and around the world. Creating a Gov 2.0 App is now easier than making a Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwich.
Government 2.0 PB&J: Portable, Better, & Just-in-time Gov 2.0
| PB&J Sandwich | PB&J Gov 2.0 |
|---|---|
| Peanut Butter: The meat in this tasty goodness. | Data: The meat in this tasty goodness. http://www.data.gov, http://www.usa.gov, http://www.census.gov, … |
| Jelly: The sweetness that makes the Peanut Butter more enjoyable. Available in multiple flavors: Grape, Strawberry, Raspberry, … | User Interface: The sweetness that makes the Data more enjoyable. Available in multiple flavors: jQuery, Ext JS, YUI, GWT, Scriptaculous, Prototype, ZK, … |
| Bread: The Portable Container baked with various types of flour: Whole-wheat, Spelt, Gluten, … Allows grabbing this tasty goodness on-the-run & sharing with others. | Apps, Widgets, Gadgets, and Plug-ins: The Portable Container baked with various types of programming languages, APIs, & Frameworks: Java, PHP, ASP, Presto Cloud, Yahoo Pipes, Grails, … Allows grabbing this tasty goodness on-the-run & sharing with others. |
Learn more about Web 2.0 Apps, Gadgets and Widgets Specifications here, “Web 2.0 Apps, Gadgets, & Widgets in the Enterprise”.
Tim Berners-Lee: Get Data on the Web
http://www.ted.com 20 years ago, Tim Berners-Lee ( @timberners_lee ) invented the World Wide Web. For his next project, he’s building a web for open, linked data that could do for numbers what the Web did for words, pictures, video: unlock our data and reframe the way we use it together.
Washington, DC Increases Government Transparency with Google Apps
Vivek Kundra, United States Chief Information Officer (CIO) makes some good points about government technology and apps in this video. Learn more about Google Apps for Government here and about secure applications to meet the needs of government (FISMA certification) here.
Better Living One City at a Time
Code for America: Leaders from technology and government, including Mark Zuckerberg, Biz Stone, Aneesh Chopra, Caterina Fake, and Tim O’Reilly, ask you to apply to be a Code for America fellow and help bring the innovation and culture of the tech industry to city government.
Peanut Butter & Jelly Time
Can You Imagine?
Can you imagine Tim O’Reilly ( @timoreilly ) on stage wearing a “Banana Suit” and singing the “Peanut Butter & Jelly Time” song at the next Gov 2.0 Summit event or the next Gov 2.0 Expo event? The funny thing is, I think he would do it, if it would get more people to adopt the strategy of “Government as a Platform“. What do you think? Lets make more PB&J Gov 2.0!
Can One Idea Change the World?
How can one idea make a difference? Blake Mycoskie of Tom’s Shoes is a good example of how one idea can change the world. He and his network have provided shoes for about a million children around the world. He is one of the Keynote Speakers at this year’s South by Southwest (#SXSW) Conference. This event jam packs the best of the best, just look at this amazing schedule. Here are a few events that stand out:
- Global Citizenship = World Peace? with Lovisa Williams ( @lovisatalk )
- Design Intersection – Cultural Sustainability and Civic Engagement with Beth Ferguson and Mouna Andraos
- How Governments are Changing Where Big Ideas Happen with Ian Kelso, Joachim Ng, Sean Kane, and Tony Schum
- Engineering vs. Psychology in Social Media: A Conversation with Jesper Andersen and Stephanie Dub
South by Southwest (SXSW) Interactive
SXSW’s original goal was to create an event that would act as a tool for creative people and the companies they work with to develop their careers, to bring together people from a wide area to meet and share ideas. That continues to be the goal today whether it is music, film or the internet. And Austin continues to be the perfect location. This is a huge event where beautiful people will be sharing amazing ideas, so here are a few tips to make it more enjoyable.
20 Tips You Must Know Before SXSW 2011
These great tips for enjoying the pleasures of SXSW were provided by Dave Delaney ( @davedelaney ).
It Does “Take a Village”
People are discovering the use of Facebook, Twitter, and other Social Networks is rapidly decreasing the degrees of separation. The “six degrees of separation” is now looking more like “four degrees of separation“. People have more power now, than ever before to work together in new innovative ways to solve every day problems.
“Be the change you want to see in the world” ~Gandhi
(See the Gandhi link for a very interesting story display of Wikipedia’s information, powered by Qwiki)