Lying with Maps: How Enbridge is Misleading the Public in its Ads

The Ottawa Citizen has a great story today about an advert by Enbridge (the company proposing to build a oil pipeline across British Columbia) that includes a “broadly representational” map that shows prospective supertankers steaming up an unobstructed Douglas Channel channel on their way to and from Kitimat – the proposed terminus of the pipeline.Read… Read more »

Is Bitcoin the new speculative market, Judge orders peace in Apple/Sammy trial and more

The MERL DiamondTouch Table was multi-touch fun for the whole family Here are today’s top tech news stories. Bitcoin, the underground currency of the Internet, is experiencing speculative growth – there have been a few things pushing up the value of the Bitcoin, including a drug purchasing version of eBay. There are now “High YieldRead… Read more »

Brigade Weekly News, August 15, 2012

Headlines This week we tuned into a video about app for fruit gleaning, read about crowd-funding civic projects, talked to cool folks about a national civic hack day, and found out about a new public process for drafting open data legislation in Pittsburgh, PA. 1. Pittsburgh Open Data Legislation Wiki Code for Pittsburgh Brigade MemberRead… Read more »

What Open Data REALLY Means for Cities

The call for cities to embrace open data is getting louder and louder. The recent White House Digital Strategy Initiative is proof of one such example in which they call for all Federal Agencies to be accessible via mobile and have information readily available to the public anytime from any device. Philosophically, we love talkingRead… Read more »

DARPA Awards Contract for Humanoid Robots, How to Hack the Curiosity Mars Rover, and More

Here is today’s federal cybersecurity and information technology news: A U.S. federal appeals court found that authorities do not need a probable-cause warrant to track suspects through their mobile phone GPS. More here. A new bill, the Wireless Surveillance Act of 2012, has been proposed, however, that would apply home search standards to cell phoneRead… Read more »

Is Your Office Being Sabotaged?

Do you ever feel like your workplace is being sabotaged? Well, it just might if any of your colleagues are adhering to a formerly classified Office of Strategic Services document, the “Simple Sabotage Field Manual.” America’s enemies will always innovate and the intelligence apparatus has always sought to evolve to counter changing threats. The sabotageRead… Read more »

Alexander Tran: Why I’m Coding for America

While in high school, my grandfather suffered from a stroke. A social, fast-talking, and brilliant civil engineer, my grandfather recovered slowly and continued to feel isolated by his new circumstances. In moments of reflection, he discovered the willingness to try on new skills, including using the web. Although bright in many capacities, my grandfather, likeRead… Read more »

Tips for Creating Better Work Relationships

Good work relationships are critical for success in management. I don’t think I could have accomplished anything of substance if I didn’t have that going for me. My strategy for that is pretty simple, so I thought I’d share: Go at their pace. If your co-worker wants coffee, have coffee. If they prefer happy hour,Read… Read more »

When the dam breaks…

It is amazing to watch how quickly things can change once a key leadership change – of mind or person – occurs in a government department. In the last four weeks Australia has gone from having no digital diplomats, lagging the world, to having four (@AusAmbUSA, @AusHCIndia@AusAmbJP and @DubesAustralia) – hopefully with many more toRead… Read more »

Where Solutions Are Created

We were practicing stories defining what we had done for others, when a marketeer pointed out that we were talking about previous engagements, not the people we supposedly would be talking to. The marketeer wanted to fashion a way to talk about the goodness of what was going to happen to the next guy. That’sRead… Read more »