Since the ascension of the first hunter-gatherer to chief of the hunter-gatherers, man has worried about the power of his rulers. He has worried about transparency. He wondered whether all the meat was being shared and whether the chief was wearing too many of the hide–I’m sorry I don’t know what I’m talking about. It was supposed to be deep. I was going to go on to compare the evolution of the chief to the modern president and neo-colonialism but then I realized that I had no idea what I was talking about. The point I making is that the same concerns hold true today. I want to make sure that we as a people aren’t being taken advantage of by those in power. I want to live in a place where all information is made public and the American people and other citizens of the world have easy access to this information.
As a technology and interactive businessman, I’ve seen the push by nations like communist China to require the internet be censored and their people left in the dark. This year was the twenty year anniversary of Tiananmen Square, an important event in the history of the struggle between communist Chinese leaders and the people who want nothing more than the freedoms we take for granted. It’s frightening and although we don’t have the same censorship when it comes to the internet, we do face challenges in our search for information.
Open Data Democracy is something touched on previously on this blog but this is slowly becoming the BOALT manifesto, as we look toward the future of this nation and our world. I recognize as a for-profit businessman the power and reach of information but also as a person active in the political community of DC I recognize the lack of technological advancement of the government when it comes to the dissemination of information. Although we’re far away from being able to access our own FBI files online, we shouldn’t be that far away from accessing infant mortality rates of northwest Ohio.
The task that stands before the government is more daunting. We live in a nation of 300 million people spread out over an area of thousands of miles. The public and government data of an area that size is beyond the scope of anything previously compiled. The hurdles are even more daunting. We have 50 states with almost as many different ways of compiling their state data.
If you visit Data.gov and click on STATE/LOCAL you’ll see that only 2 states, California and Utah, and the District of Columbia have created state websites that you as a citizen can go to find government compiled information about your area. Although this is a start the problem that exists now is that the California, Utah and DC information is in different formats. There isn’t a uniform standard for government agencies to work from. Imagine if the mail system didn’t have guidelines for how you address an envelope. The mail would take forever to be delivered. There needs to be an information standard that all government agencies have to follow, from the smallest town in rural Montana to the Oval Office. Nothing would make it easier than a national, if not international standard. Eventually, I hope, the world will be more willing to share information on a global scale, and so an international standard is not so far-fetched. There are a few things that I suggest doing to get us closer to a national standard:
1. Support contests like AppsForDemocracy.com. Open Data Democracy is a bit dry and boring but contests like Apps for Democracy raise awareness for the issue by showcasing the amazing applications that can be created and how the average citizen can benefit. For example AreYouSafeDC.com is an application for your iPhone that takes crime data from Data.gov and other sites to tell you how safe an area of DC is.
2. Create and release free tools that make the transition to a national standard easy for small municipalities without the tech know-how of large cities to implement.
3. Change has to be inexpensive as well. Smaller communities can’t afford large overhauls of existing systems.
4. Lay out guidelines and standards in easy to follow and easy to access ways. For example, on Data.gov a page should be included with explicit and easy to follow instructions for communities to lay out their data for faster implementation.
Looking at the government’s first steps towards Open Data Democracy, I’m confident that a global standard can be achieved someday and we can all live in world where ideas and information is exchanged freely and fairly. An information utopia.
Tags: data.gov, Open Data Democracy
