Open Data

Five Tips for The Trip (Downtown) to Government Finances

In yesterday’s online training, “Full Disclosure: How Governments Can Best Display Financial Transparency to the Public,” audience members visited the City of Chattanooga – virtually of course – to get a glimpse into the City’s brand new Open Budget Application – launched only three days ago as a subset of their already welcomed Open DataRead… Read more »

The Evolution of Government Financial Transparency

You’ve probably heard something about the DATA Act, the first U.S. open data law that requires all federal agencies to standardize and publish their spending reports. However, do you know how that Act came about? More importantly, do you know how and when it will be achieved? Below we offer a brief timeline to offerRead… Read more »

Spending Data: Boring Or A Bureaucracy No-Brainer?

Why government transparency? We talk a lot about transparency, but what do citizens really want to know about all of the extraneous government information they’ve got floating around? The most obvious answer is that people want to know that the hard-earned money they fork over each year on taxes is put to good use. LikeRead… Read more »

Thoughts from New Zealand: Does Open Source Lead to Open Society?

The set up Last week I want to a conference called Open Source // Open Society (OS//OS). While conferences are great opportunities to learn new things, I normally wouldn’t blog about one. But this one got me thinking about the ‘open society’ aspect and how it fits with government, especially with the work my team isRead… Read more »

The Next Generation of Open Data

These days, it seems like people are obsessed with numbers. It’s often thought that numbers and statistics are the most powerful source of data. With hard numbers, you can create visuals and graphs to prove your point. No one can dispute your hard data claims. Right? However, there’s a strong argument for moving away fromRead… Read more »

Government Secrets Bared!

Just how easy is it to get government agencies to bare their secrets? The Center for Effective Government recently came out with its yearly scorecard assessing the fifteen government agencies on their adherence to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). Sean Moulton, Director of Open Government Policy at the Center for Effective Government, spoke withRead… Read more »

All Data as a Service (DaaS/BDaaS) – Who’s Your D-a-a-S Enabler?

There are three primary and distinct roles to consider, whether you’re building or buying DaaS – regardless of the type or characteristics of data that’s being exchanged; big data, open data, fast data, IoT/IoE data, metadata, microdata, multimedia content, structured, non-structured, semi-structured…ALL DATA. The DaaS Consumer – who needs not only to acquire data fromRead… Read more »

What’s The Government’s GPA? Part II

As discussed yesterday in part one of this interview, there is a lot to recommend testing government agencies to glean quantifiable results or grades. Having numerical values to analyze the government’s performance allows for a better understanding of the status quo, and improved decision-making. Deloitte University Press recently authored a report entitled “Accountability Quantified: WhatRead… Read more »