White House Open Data Policy: Promoting Openness and Interoperability

May 9, 2013 By

The U.S. Federal Government, state and local governments, and governments around the world possess treasure troves of valuable data that have gone largely untapped for many years.  More than ever before, citizens want access to government data, and they want it applied in innovative ways to which they are increasingly becoming accustomed.

Government’s acceptance and utilization of new technologies is needed to enhance government’s mission.  Technologies that leverage data analytics to provide innovative functions and services hold the key for governments to provide improved services and to better understand how well they are fulfilling their missions.

Today, the White House issued an Executive Order “Making Open and Machine Readable the New Default for Government Information” and an OMB Memorandum (M-13-13) updating the Digital Government Strategy, originally published last May.  The updated policy seeks to further enhance the government’s open data initiative, making machine readable data the default for government data, while helping to establish a framework for effective information management at each stage of the information’s lifecycle to promote openness and interoperability.

Specifically, this Memorandum requires agencies to collect or create information in a way that supports downstream information processing and dissemination activities. This includes using machine readable and open formats, data standards, and common core and extensible metadata for all new information creation and collection efforts.  It also includes agencies ensuring information stewardship through the use of open licenses and review of information for privacy, confidentiality, security, or other restrictions to release. Additionally, it involves agencies building or modernizing information systems in a way that maximizes interoperability and information accessibility, maintains internal and external data asset inventories, enhances information safeguards, and clarifies information management responsibilities.

Beyond open data, governments need to embrace policies that enable a streamlined approach to innovative applications that draw from and analyze this data.  This emphasis on data analytics leads to data driven innovation (DDI) allowing governments to use data to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of government, as well as preventing waste, fraud and abuse.  Embracing open data, as the White House has done through the issuance of this policy, maximizes the full potential of DDI for governments to embrace open data policies, use public-private partnerships to provide access to critical public data, and to adopt enterprise architectures that enables sharing.  These steps will put public sector data to innovative uses that can reap the economic and societal benefits of DDI.

We applaud the efforts of the Administration that led to this policy and encourage the White House to continue to embrace open data policies, while also embracing policies that increase the use of data analytics—pulling data from myriad sources—to make strategic decisions, to encourage research and development around data science, and encourage teaching and training for data scientists and professionals with strong data analytics skills that are already in high demand in both the public and private sectors.

Michael Hettinger is VP for the Public Sector Innovation Group (PSIG) at SIIA. Follow his PSIG tweets at @SIIAPSIG. Sign up for the Public Sector Innovation Roundup email newsletter for weekly updates.

Share|
Filed Under: Data-Driven Innovation, Policy, PSIG

Crafting video content for your company

May 9, 2013 By

The New York Times made an interesting decision last month. They decided to let video scale their paywall. From now on, all videos on NYTimes.com can be viewed for free by all readers, subscriber or not, on desktop, mobile or app. In addition, the 10-article monthly limit for non-subscribers will not count video views. Now yes, they have a sponsor—Acura and Microsoft, so look for those pre-rolls—but the proliferation and popularity of video content can’t be denied.

The Nieman Journalism Lab has been covering the Times’s video ascent. Justin Ellis recently wrote this: “We recognize this is very important for audiences and recognize we’ve got to change the perception of The New York Times as a place you just read to a place you watch,” said Denise Warren, the Times executive vice president of the digital products and services group. Readers have come to expect a video experience, Warren said, and as the Times produces more video content the paper has to make sure it reaches the widest audience possible.

Let’s repeat that: Readers have come to expect a video experience. You can say that this doesn’t apply to you, but weren’t some information providers expressing that belief about the Internet 10, 15 years ago? I’m still doing fine with print. Video advertising dollars are a hot commodity right now, and as Ellis writes, “the best way to capture more video dollars is through producing more video.”

Of course, this still seems like pie in the sky to many publishers—choose your favorite filling—but it doesn’t have to be. On Wednesday, May 22, Gale Media’s Lindsay Konzak, vice president of content, and Jenel Stelton-Holtmeier, director of digital media, will present the webinar, Video Production for Information Publishers: How to Create Programs That Improve Engagement and Conversions—Without Breaking the Bank. Gale has produced video interviews, playbooks, briefings and other programming designed to engage and educate their audience. They’re well-done, and as the title says, haven’t busted the bank.

They’ve also been conducting a survey of SIPA members on using video, so if you have not filled that out yet, we encourage you to do so.  Here’s the link. And you can speak to Lindsay and Jenel – and other video leaders – at the SIPA 2013 Conference, June 5-7 in Washington, D.C.

Rebecca Howard is the new general manager for video production at the Times. In an interview with Nieman, she said that her place there is unique because she will report to the business and editorial sides. (This is not your grandfather’s old grey lady.) She views video as an engagement tool. “We…think that when people can experience our excellent video, it actually has the opportunity to serve as a beacon and get people to come back to the site — even potentially become a subscriber,” she said.

Like any other content, video needs to be good to be successful. “We look at it as an opportunity of being curators of excellent content,” Howard said. “…people come to the Times every day because of our excellent judgment of what we’re putting in front of you to look at, in terms of every vertical. We have an opportunity for aggregation of premium content, so we can offer what is really interesting to us that we think might be interesting to you as well. So we’ll be looking at some premium aggregation.”

Marketing videos are also fast becoming a critical tool to get customers on board. In a recent survey by Invodo, 52% of consumers who watch product videos said the videos made them feel more confident about their purchases. Whether it’s your publisher talking about the value of a subscription or a product video for a high-end report, marketing videos can be very effective.

Konzak and Stelton-Holtmeier will also discuss equipment on May 22. Howard says that most of the Times video coverage of the recent Boston tragedy was shot by iPhone, so it certainly is becoming easier. “There’s ways to use your phone to get great content and ways to cut that content,” Howard said. “…we did such a great job with it that you would never know it was done on an iPhone. We’re definitely looking at ways that we can put the power of visual reporting into everybody that’s working with us.”

Us, too.

Ronn LevineRonn Levine began his career as a reporter for The Washington Post and has won numerous writing and publications awards since. Most recently, he spent 12 years at the Newspaper Association of America covering a variety of topics before joining SIPA in 2009 as managing editor. Follow Ronn on Twitter at @SIPAOnline

Share|
Filed Under: SIPA

Public Sector Innovation Roundup

May 9, 2013 By

White House releases updated open data policy: On May 9th, the White House released an update to last year’s memorandum on open data and the resulting Digital Government Strategy. The new policy, accompanied by an Executive Order, aims to make machine readable data the default for government data, while helping to establish a framework for effective information management at each stage of the information’s lifecycle to promote openness and interoperability. See the OMB memo here.

Spires resigns as DHS CIO: After nearly two months on leave, DHS CIO Richard Spires officially resigned from the agency this week. No reason for the resignation was given. Spires had been at DHS for nearly 3 ½ years and in addition to his responsibilities at DHS, also served as Vice Chair of the CIO Council. While the rumors have been rampant about the reasons for his extended leave, most of the speculation has focused on a general dispute with senior DHS officials over the role and authority of the CIO, a subject sure to come more to the forefront as a result of this situation. Earlier this week, FCW published an op-ed that I penned on the evolving role of the federal CIO, which is linked here and FCW has full coverage of the Spires story here.

Jeff Zients steps down from OMB post: Jeff Zients, who had been Acting Director of OMB for more than a year, prior to Sylvia Burwell’s confirmation a couple weeks ago, announced that he was stepping down as Deputy Director effective May 1st. Zients, a former management consultant, was the nation’s first Chief Performance Officer, in addition to being the Deputy Director for Management. Lisa Brown has been handling the CPO duties while Zients has been acting OMB director. Zients departure, along with that of performance guru Shelley Metzenbaum, announced last week, leaves a significant gap in the “M” and OMB. No word yet on what the Administration plans to do to fill these positions, nor is there any word on what’s next for Zients who at one time had expressed interest in being the US Trade Representative. Federal Times has the story.

NIST issues updated security controls for federal IT systems: On April 30th NIST issued an update to the federal systems security controls contained in NIST Special Publication 800-53, Security and Privacy Controls for Federal information Systems and Organizations. The updated policy, the forth update to SP 800-53 and the first since 2009, addresses issues such as mobile and cloud computing, applications security, supply chain risks and privacy concerns. It also calls for maintaining routine best practices to reduce information security risks and pushes a renewed emphasis on secure software development. See the full text here.

FOSE to kick off May 14th: The annual FOSE Conference being held at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center is set to kick off a big week for federal IT. General Stan McCrystal will open the conference with a keynote presentation on Tuesday morning followed by three full days of conference sessions on cloud, mobile, cybersecurity, and big data. Other keynotes include former Redskin quarterback Joe Theismann, Senator Tom Carper (D-DE), Chairman of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs and Federal CIO, Steve VanRoekel. Yours truly will be moderating a session on leveraging government-wide acquisition vehicles (GWACS) to acquire cloud on Tuesday afternoon and SIIA is hosting a reception for conference attendees on Wednesday, May 15th. See more at the FOSE website.

Michael Hettinger is VP for the Public Sector Innovation Group (PSIG) at SIIA. Follow his PSIG tweets at @SIIAPSIG. Sign up for the Public Sector Innovation Roundup email newsletter for weekly updates.

Share|
Filed Under: PSIG

Building on awareness through social media

May 8, 2013 By

Lately, I’ve been receiving all these emails from Washington, D.C.’s oldest historical buildings-the Marine Corps War Memorial, the Washington National Cathedral, Dumbarton Oaks-asking me to vote for them on social media. And I didn’t understand why. Now I do.

According to an article in The Washington Post, the National Trust for Historic Preservation and the American Express Foundation are bringing a $1 million “American Idol”-inspired contest to Washington this spring. The historical properties with the most tweets, friends and votes can win as much as $100,000. The National Cathedral is apparently in the lead. “The organization taped a YouTube video featuring mason foreman Joe Alonso to make a pitch for the 106-year-old building, which still has safety netting in place to protect against crumbling mortar.”

This may be the most clear-cut social media ROI we’ve seen: get the most traffic, win $100,000. The mix of old and new reminds me a little of my conversation with Lisa Anthony, publisher of InFaith Publishing Group. “We’re trying to help [the priests with tweeting],” she said. “They don’t know how to use LinkedIn, and they’re intimidated by Facebook. That’s more for the parents and parishioners and takes more commitment than Twitter. Sixty-three is the average age of a Catholic priest, so you can see there is some educating to do…We’ll try things on social media to test the market. We put a saints piece on Facebook and it went over really well…For Twitter we’ll post surveys and links to promotions or content we’re running. We’ve even done force-free trials on Twitter.”

Anthony uses SocialOomph.com to help her with social media. “It helps me schedule my tweets throughout the day, so I’m not overdoing it,” she said.

The upcoming SIPA 2013 Conference, June 5-7, in Washington, D.C., will feature both a session and a roundtable on social media—and many networking conversations. Social Media: The Big Picture for Marketers will be led by Rachel Yeomans, vice president of marketing at Astek and proprietor of The Working Wardrobe website.

Lesley Ellen Harris, who was profiled in this space on Monday and will be speaking on copyright at the Conference, is also hooked on social media. Her advice: “Go on Twitter, see who’s retweeting what. Go into LinkedIn and contribute to discussions and dialogue. Social media is fine but it’s not the first thing I would do every day. It’s a way to share what you’re doing. But you can’t get carried away. If you have an addictive personality, stay away. Be very realistic. My friend says that at the end of every workday, she spends 15 minutes on LinkedIn. That’s okay if you can keep to that. I love blogging, but it takes a lot of time [whereas] I can do Twitter while eating lunch or in a carpool line.”

There is also a method to the madness of supporting your local historical monument this way. “Voting online, posting photos and tweets after visits all score points and—ideally—increases the buildings’ exposure to visitors and the organizations’ capacity for marketing through social media,” the Post wrote.

It’s an interesting concept, almost teetering towards gamification. Have a contest, draw people to your site. The key might be that once they’re there, you need to take full advantage and engage. Sure enough, there it is on the National Museum of Women in the Arts site: “We broke the glass ceiling—now we need a new roof! These funds will support vital roof repairs that will ensure the continued integrity of NMWA’s building—and a place for women artists.”

Clear and clever. Social media may require some out-of-the-box thinking—and may not always lead so directly to monetization—but its upside is very high. Try things.

Ronn LevineRonn Levine began his career as a reporter for The Washington Post and has won numerous writing and publications awards since. Most recently, he spent 12 years at the Newspaper Association of America covering a variety of topics before joining SIPA in 2009 as managing editor. Follow Ronn on Twitter at @SIPAOnline

Share|
Filed Under: SIPA, SIPA Con

Data’s Big Impact on the World

May 8, 2013 By

In January, SIIA announced its commitment to Data-Driven Innovation as a top policy priority in 2013.  As part of this initiative, its white paper Data Driven Innovation a Guide for Policymakers: Understanding and Enabling the Economic and Social Value of Data will be released soon.

Now an article that reinforces the points made in the white paper has appeared in the May/June issue of Foreign Affairs Magazine – The Rise of Big Data: How It’s Changing the Way We Think About the World by Kenneth Cukier and Viktor Mayer-Schoenberger.  The most important point of both the SIIA white paper and the Foreign Affairs articles is this:

New data collection and analytical techniques allow the use of massive amounts of data to help businesses and governments make everyday things work better.

The Foreign Affairs article described three main changes in how we go about approaching data.  In addition to collecting and using large amounts of data we need to accept data that is messy or unorganized instead of just using data that is clean or organized.  Furthermore we need to place less emphasis on causation and instead look at correlation.  In short, we should ask “what?” and not “why?”

Some of the challenges to data-driven innovation are due to people applying the same mindset that worked in the past when we didn’t have the ability to utilize large amounts of data.  One example from the article highlights that for a long time, people tried unsuccessfully to make computers “learn how to do something.”  With increased amounts of data and analytical capabilities, we are instead giving computers a massive amount of data and empowering them to use it to come up with probabilities of something happening.  In the past, analysts were usually limited to smaller amounts of data, and therefore the data inputs had to be precise and accurate.  But now with the increased amount of data, it does not have to be as precise or accurate because the sheer volume of data can fill in these gaps. 

The case study that perhaps provides the best example of what big data can be used for in the paper is about Google, and how they were able to use search records to track outbreaks of the flu.  In 2009 Google “took the 50 million most commonly searched terms between 2003 and 2008 and compared them against historical influenza data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.” By running all of this data through algorithms, Google was able to come up with a list of 45 terms that had a strong correlation with the CDC’s data on the flu.  The biggest difference in how Google and the CDC were able to come to this conclusion is that Google was only concerned with how those terms were related and what that meant, not why people were getting sick as the CDC was asking.  By approaching the data in this way, Google was able to come up with an answer in close to real-time instead of several weeks, which in the case of pandemic is crucial to saving lives.

The article also highlights that one of the biggest potential concerns associated with big data is its ability to create “Big Brother.”  So to be sure, there are some risks associated with data driven innovation, but the article appropriately concludes that there is no such thing as bad data. Rather, the potential use of massive amounts of data to achieve positive outcomes in the way we live far outweighs the potential concerns.   

Ken WaschDenys Emmert is the Public Policy intern at SIIA. He has a degree in marketing and political science from Florida State University.

Share|
Filed Under: Data-Driven Innovation

SIIA Announces Top Innovators in Education Technology

May 8, 2013 By

This week SIIA recognized four education technology solutions with five key awards for their originality, innovation, and industry promise.
During SIIA’s bi-annual Innovation Incubator Program, held in connection with this week’s SIIA Ed Tech Industry Summit, simCEO and See.Touch.Learn. were voted by 350 attendees as being the Most Innovative and Most Likely to Succeed, respectively. Citelighter was voted runner-up for Most Innovative, and scrible was voted runner-up for Most Likely to Succeed. Citelighter also earned the Educator’s Choice Award based on votes from educators across the country.

The Innovation Incubator Program supports innovation in the education technology industry by raising the profile of promising new technologies while connecting these innovators with captains of industry for mentorship, expert advice, investment opportunities, and partnerships to support growth.

Applicants were assessed for the Innovation Incubator Program on a broad range of criteria, including the education focus, end-user impact, market need for the innovation, representation of K-12/postsecondary market levels, and the level of originality and innovation. Ten finalists were selected for the program

More about the winners:

Most Innovative:
simCEO, Jetlag Learning
simCEO creates online learning simulations where students compete and interact with one another – instead of a program – to make the environment and the learning more dynamic. Students apply skills in real-world environments without right/wrong answers. Our first solution, simCEO targets entrepreneurship and financial literacy where students create their own company then buy/sell shares in each other’s companies. Teachers keep the simulation dynamic through news articles.

Educator’s Choice and Most Innovative Runner-Up:
Citelighter, Citelighter Inc
Citelighter is an academic research platform that allows students to save, organize, and automatically cite content. Once completed they can open Citelighter in a Google doc to have their research next to their writing. As students undergo a critical thinking process (research, organizing, writing) we capture their behaviors and present it back to their teachers so they can see how and where their students need help. This appears like strands of DNA, but they are strands of thought.

Most Likely to Succeed:
See.Touch.Learn., Brain Parade, LLC
See.Touch.Learn., an iPad visual learning & assessment system, improves the social interaction & communication skills of special needs students. Parents & teachers are turning away from traditional, static picture cards towards See.Touch.Learn.’s easy-to-use & effective personalized picture card learning tool. With stunning images, a community of content created by thousands of users, plus their own personal content, teachers & parents can deliver highly personalized instruction & assessments.

Most Likely to Succeed Runner-Up:
scrible, scrible
scrible makes online reading and research apps for students/instructors and publishers. Our Web app lets you annotate webpages in your browser and then save, share and manage them in the cloud. Our Student Edition adds academic features (citations, reports, etc.). Instructors use scrible for collaborative e-reading exercises. Our Classroom Edition will empower them to teach critical reading skills using online reading/research assignments. Our annotation tools help publishers make content interactive.

The other Innovation Incubator finalists were:

Video of all the Incubator presentations will be available soon. For more information about the Innovation Incubator Program, visit http://www.siia.net/etis/2013/incubator.asp.

Karen BillingsKaren Billings is Vice President for the Education Division at SIIA. Follow the SIIA Education Team on Twitter at @SIIAEducation

Share|
Filed Under: Ed Tech Industry Summit, Education

Intellectual Property Roundup

May 8, 2013 By

Aereo Files Complaint Against CBS to Stop More Lawsuits (CNET)
After CBS vowed to file another lawsuit against Aereo in Boston, despite losing the last couple rulings, Aereo filed a complaint against CBS asking the court to prevent CBS from filing any more lawsuits against it.

A Caribbean Headache for Obama’s New Trade Rep (Bloomberg Businessweek)
In an effort to exact revenge against the U.S. for kicking its online casino operators out of the country, Antigua is now threatening to allow people to ignore protection of intellectual property rights for trademarks and copyrights, and is taking bids from websites that traffic in pirated goods, including top contender The Pirate Bay.

Judge Asks IRS, Feds to Investigate Copyright-Trolling Attorneys (Wired)
A federal judge sanctioned Prenda Law attorneys for running a BitTorrent “copyright lawsuit factory,” and recommended federal prosecutors investigate for potential criminal charges.

MegaUpload Lawyers Claim DOJ Charges Have No Basis in Law (PC World)
MegaUpload lawyers released a white paper arguing that the U.S. Department of Justice’s copyright infringement case against the file storage service is “prosecutorial overreach” based on a misreading of U.S. law and a “theory” of criminal secondary copyright infringement.

German Court Convicts, Sentences BitTorrent Site Operator to Nearly Four Years (Ars Technica)
A German district court sentenced a 33-year-old alleged operator of a Russian-hosted torrent site to three years and ten months in prison for abetting copyright infringement, one of the harshest sentences ever.

Keith Kupferschmid is General Counsel and SVP, Intellectual Property Policy & Enforcement at SIIA.

Share|
Filed Under: Anti-Piracy, Policy, Policy - Intellectual Property
« Older Posts
Newer Posts »