Open Government Links of the Week – September 9, 2011
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Local Government Guidelines for Working with the Media During an Energy Emergency
- “This document provides strategies that local governments can use for communicating effectively with the media, and for cultivating relationships with both the media and the public during energy-related emergencies.”
Code for America Announces Winners
- Several cities have been selected to participate in CfA’s planned 2012 schedule. Find the winners listed here and here.
- Find out what Code for America does here.
Citizen-Sourced Redistricting Efforts Are Reaching the Finish Line
- Here’s Technically Philly’s post on the updated situation.
Look at Cook sets a high bar for open government data visualizations
- Open source tools and a focus on user experience elevate Cook County’s “Look at Cook” data website.
The O’Reilly Radar Visualization of the Week: Mapping U.S. Job Losses
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#GOV20 Takeaways from the Space Shuttle’s Final Launch
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There’s more than one way to look at Friday’s historic final launch of Space Shuttle Atlantis (STS-135). What can local, state, or other government agencies learn from how NASA handled the event?
Here are just some ways that NASA used the web to both build it’s brand and provide visitors with information that they were looking for. Also, don’t miss the photo collection from the event at the end of this post!
Click the titles to go to that part of the post…
Content and Accessibility
Landing Page
When you visited NASA.gov around launch-time, you didn’t have to go far for the content that you were (probably) looking for regarding the Space Shuttle. NASA had a redirect setup to take you to a landing page for STS-135 with live video of the event front-and-center. On this same page, they had columns for other relevant video, images, and some live-blogging of the events. Some time after the launch, they had another landing page (photo) setup that provided more links to resources about STS-135.
The Takeaway? Make it very easy for people to find the content that they’re looking for.
This takes us back to the quote that we linked to from our coverage of Space Shuttle Endeavor’s final launch (STS-134) from the middle of May:
Making important agency information easy to find online can also be a key factor in improving the agency’s public image, said General Services Administration digital government specialist Sheila Campbell. (from the article “Open government requires accessibility, not just data, specialists say” on nextgov.com)
Video and Replays
Video in multiple forms
There were multiple ways to view the Space Shuttle’s launch. NASA TV had it covered, so if you had that channel on TV you could watch it. Other TV stations covered the event as well, but not to the extent that NASA TV did. News channels have more things to cover than just this event. They move on to other stories. So how can people who want more information find it out? How about straight from the source… NASA.
The Takeaway? Provide coverage of the event yourself. This way, the media can’t cut your message short. If people want to see all of what happened – in context – then provide it to them. It will also help build loyalty between you and your citizens because it helps them feel like they’re a part of it.
Replays
They also had a video clip from the launch available within hours. Not only did they have live video of the event, but immediately after it was over, they showed replays from a wide variety of cool camera angles (see screen-shots for some of them below). See more on-demand videos about STS-135 here.
The Takeaway? While you’re at it, provide visitors with a way to relive what happened. For those who weren’t able to watch the live event, they can still see what happened (as if they were watching it live – except they can skip to the part of the video that interests them the most).
More ways to Interact
This provided opportunities for people to share photos of the event and get real-time information directly from the source. NASA can’t control what people post on Twitter about the event, but they can broadcast accurate information and it provides their fans with a terrific place to interact with each other. Speaking of interaction, NASA had a “NASA Tweetup“. What’s that? According to their website, “A Tweetup is an informal meeting of people who use the social messaging medium Twitter. NASA Tweetups provide [people who Follow @NASA on Twitter] with the opportunity to go behind-the-scenes at NASA facilities and events and speak with scientists, engineers, astronauts and managers. NASA Tweetups range from two hours to two days in length and include a “meet and greet” session to allow participants to mingle with fellow Tweeps and the people behind NASA’s Twitter feeds.”
The Takeaway? Let people go behind the scenes. It shows your biggest fans that you care and in turn, they’ll likely promote you and meetup with other enthusiasts. What if a local government did this with high schools…?
Real-Time Space Shuttle Tracker Mashup
“You can now track the space shuttle during launch and landing in Google Earth using real-time data from Mission Control.” (source)
The Takeaway? Give people ways to interact with data in cool ways. This data was practical and you could see why they put it out there. It’s easily understood by the public and it’s fascinating.
Photos
Here’s some screen-shot photos of the launch as it was happening live and when they showed some replays… photos are another tool that governments can use to inspire their audience (in this case, I took screen-shots of video, but you get the point)…
(Click images to see larger photos!)
*In case there is any confusion, NASA does not endorse our products. Also, here’s the use guidelines for NASA imagery, etc (so please follow them if using any photos from this post). These photos aren’t necessarily in the order that they happened. Photo credits: the NASA.gov website (mainly screenshots of video).
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Gov't & Technology, Miscellaneous, Open Government
The 2010 Center of Population for the U.S.
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The U.S. Census Bureau recently announced the “Center of Population” for the 2010 Census.
What is the “Center of Population”? According to the Census Bureau,
The mean center of population is determined as the place where an imaginary, flat, weightless and rigid map of the United States would balance perfectly if all residents were of identical weight.
So, onto what you’re really wanting to see. Drum-roll please…
The 2010 Center of Population for the U.S. is in Texas County, Missouri (2.9 miles from Plato, MO).
Here’s the official press release about it. Click here for an interactive timeline map of previous centers of population.
Some more information about the history of the Center of Population for the U.S.:
Historically, the center of population has followed a trail that reflects the sweep of the nation’s brush stroke across America’s population canvas. The sweep reflects the settling of the frontier, waves of immigration and the migration west and south. Since 1790, the location has moved in a westerly, then a more southerly pattern. In 2000, the new center of population in Edgar Springs, Mo., was more than 1,000 miles from the first center in 1790, which was near Chestertown, Md.
Here’s the center of population for each state (the black dots on the map below). The map uses data from Census.gov from here.
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Local Government, Miscellaneous
Open Government Links of the Week – May 13, 2011
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“Open government requires accessibility, not just data, specialists say”
- “Making important agency information easy to find online can also be a key factor in improving the agency’s public image, said General Services Administration digital government specialist Sheila Campbell.”
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“Open Government Philadelphia: an initiative and policy paper from Councilman Bill Green”
- The post has “his 10 recommendations and what they could mean for the future of Philadelphia governance, in addition to a related presentation his office shared.”
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“Model local open government initiative gains traction in Cook County. Who’s next?”
- This post by Alex Howard has several bits of recent info going on in the local open government space.
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Open Government West in Portland, Oregon- It’s scheduled for Fri. and Sat.
- Portions of it have been live-streamed
- Follow the Twitter hashtag #ogw11 for more info.
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Oregon Debuts State Broadband Map
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New Website Tracks FOIA Withholding Challenges
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There’s a new FOIA website in town. The other week, FOIA.gov was launched by the Department of Justice. This time, it’s not a government FOIA site, but one done by Syracuse University (with a grant from the CS Fund/Warsh-Mott Legacy).
Designed to bring more transparency to FOIA withholding decisions, the new site — http://FOIAproject.org — gives the American people a way to track all instances in which a federal agency’s decision to deny government records has become the subject of a suit under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) since October 1, 2009. (source)
The site “is updated daily with the latest court FOIA filings and provides extensive information about the names of withholding agency, the names of the plaintiffs, the location where the action was brought, along with the actual complaint and attachments that were filed.” Find out more about the website’s launch here.
Source: http://trac.syr.edu/foiaproject/foia_map.shtml
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