Thanks for having me as FGI September Blogger of the Month! I am signing off now and returning to my regular gig at the SLA Govt Info Blog but will remain a faithful reader. I will also keep spreading the news about the great work that FDLP librarians do. A fine example just came up on GOVDOC-L: the newly updated Federal Websites for Tribal Libraries and Tribal College Libraries, created by the Oklahoma Department of Libraries. Wonderful!

Happy October,
Peggy

The Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board released an upgraded version of the Recovery.gov website on Monday, September 28. Recovery.gov is, per the website, "the U.S. government’s official website providing easy access to data related to Recovery Act spending and allows for the reporting of potential fraud, waste, and abuse." The site now has a zip code search for finding local Recovery Act awards, a Data Download section, and a new home page layout with more information upfront.

The reviews of the recent upgrade are out and can be summed up as "meh." The conclusion from interested bloggers seems to be that while a few improvements have been made around the edges, there is little new to shout about. Observers are waiting for the real show, the scheduled October 15 release of the first recipient contract data and October 30 release of the first recipient grant and loan data. From the blogs:

Meet the New Recovery.gov, "(mostly) the same as the old Recovery.gov", from OMB Watch Blog, September 28.

New Recovery.gov Goes Live, Key Data to be Released Later, from WSJ.com Washington Wire, September 28.

Grading the New Recovery.gov, a substantial review from Sunlight Labs, September 29.

Meanwhile, CRS librarians have updated their compilation of links to Recovery-related information on the web in this report available from OpenCRS.com: Authoritative Resources on the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), updated September 10.

Los Angeles Time business columnist Michael Hiltzik discusses key players in the Free Government Information movement in the article These crusaders bring transparency to government (28 September 2009).

As promised, here is my report on the first-ever U.S. Congress Camp. The event was an unconference held in Washington, DC on September 12-13, 2009. Participants were from the civic hacking community, advocacy software companies, advocacy groups, gov 2.0 crowd, academia (public policy), and social media start-ups, with a sprinkling from congressional offices, and one or more from big tech and and other walks of life.

The announced focus of Congress Camp was citizen-Congress communications, although topics related to congressional content in general came up. (See more on the communications topic from the recent CRS report on use of Twitter by Congress.)

You can read and hear about Congress Camp on the web. See:

• CongressCamp site and blog
• Congress Camp Provides Dynamic Dialogue... posting on NextGenWeb, September 17
• Congress Camp: Where the Hill Meets Web 2.0 September 16 posting on INfluence, the blog of Forum One Communications
• Government 2.0 Radio September 20 episode, featuring interviews with Congress Camp participants (one hour; starts with general Gov 2.0 news)

Congressional staffers participating in Congress Camp were interested in moving forward but provided much-needed reality checks for the tech crowd: congressional offices have outdated hardware and software; they are already swamped with email that is not from their district or can't be authenticated; they get email that their constituents didn't even know they sent (automatically generated when they clicked on something unrelated but tempting); in some districts most or many constituents do not even have ready access to the Internet; etc. In spite of these obstacles, some congressional offices are already applying a 2.0 approach. For examples, see the case studies section of this Embracing Gov 2.0 post on the Cangress Camp blog.

Some camp participants seemed to be much more familiar with tech than Congress, or with the political side rather than the governing side. No doubt they learned much in two days of dialogue. Gov 2.0er Noel Dickover summed it up in a tweet: "My overall thought on #CongCamp is that we are still at the awareness and sensemaking stage at #opengov".

This post follows my September 18th post, Gov 2.0 Expo Showcase: Govies Represent.

The Gov 2.0 Summit, sponsored by O'Reilly Media and TechWeb and held in Washington, DC on September 9th and 10th, was a Big Event--particularly for those who were there. Lots of blogging, lots of tech press coverage. It was full of big tech invitees and priced too high for the average local government webmaster or civic hacker. And me. So this is a view from the outside.

Fortunately, videos from many of the conference sessions are available on the Summit website. You can review the full schedule of sessions and click on "Read more" to link to videos and any other material available for a session. One of the highlights, based on the chatter, was Carl Malamud's By the People... talk. The Summit website does not have it, but the video of Malamud's talk has been posted to his own site and is linked from FGI as a lunchtime listen.

Here is a sampling of some of the videos available:

Rapid Fire: Setting the Stage, esteemed panel presents 2.0 examples

GeoEnabling Gov 2.0, Jack Dangermond, founder and president of ESRI

Creating an Effective Platform, John Markoff of NY Times interviews the father of the Internet, the co-founder of Twitter, and Facebook's DC rep

Based on the tweets, the Gov 2.0 Summit attendees seemed to be genuinely ecstatic about the show and new to many of the existing projects and the landscape of government information. Whether they see a market here is another question.

For more coverage, check out the Summit website's long list of links to news articles about the conference.

Catching up with some updates released in August:

CRS has updated its Access to Government Information in the United States report. The latest edition is dated August 31, 2009 (via OpenCRS.com).

The Justice Department released its 2009 edition of Department of Justice Guide to the Freedom of Information Act on August 10. The announcement says the "2009 edition contains a newly updated and revised discussion of all aspects of the Freedom of Information Act, as amended by the OPEN Government Act, including the Act's procedural requirements, its exemptions and exclusions, as well as considerations applicable to FOIA litigation."

Last week's Gov 2.0 Expo conference, run by O'Reilly Media and TechWeb, featured over 25 five-minute presentations by people who have managed government projects -- at all levels of government -- that involve Web 2.0 methods. For the summaries and presentation links related to each speaker, see the full Gov 2.0 Expo schedule; each session title is linked to the relevant information.

In 2.0 participatory fashion, attendees texted to vote for the best presentation in each program segment. The winners were:

City of Santa Cruz Offers Blueprint for Solving CA Budget Crisis with Social Media - Peter Koht (City of Santa Cruz)
txts 4 africa - Merrick Schaefer (UNICEF)
Transit 2.0 at BART.gov - Melissa Jordan (Bay Area Rapid Transit)
Utah Department of Public Safety Media Portal - Jeff Nigbur (State of Utah, Department of Public Safety)
Digital Diplomacy: Understanding Islam through Virtual Worlds - Rita King (Dancing Ink Productions)

Of special interest to the FGI audience, Steve Schultze of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard discussed RECAP in his presentation, Crowdsourcing Federal Court Transparency. Also of interest, the presentation on EPA's MyEnvironment, MyEnvironment: Environmental Information for Your Community, generated lots of approving noises from the audience.

Tim O'Reilly was everywhere at the conference, quickly and respectfully responding to tweets and blog posts critiquing his "Government as a Platform" catch phrase/vision/conversation-starter.

His keynote:
Opening Keynote: Tim O'Reilly, O'Reilly Media (video, blip.tv)
And his "Government as a Platform" talk recorded prior to the conference:
The Platform for Change (video, blip.tv)

O'Reilly Media must view the Expo Showcase as a success; another has been announced for 2010.

The Expo preceded the main event, the Gov 2.0 Summit. I'll have more on that in a later post.

Related post: Gov 2.0 Expo and the Apps for America 2 Challenge Winners

The Associated Press (AP) has a story out today covering the Cyber Cemetery project at the University of North Texas Libraries. I came across a version at the Federal News Radio website, but I imagine it has been picked up elsewhere:

Government Web sites kept alive at Cyber Cemetery, 14 September 2009.

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has posted a first draft of their eGovernment Working Group's guidelines for governments putting data on the Web, Publishing Open Government Data. (And hey! It's not in PDF format.)

The W3C posted this notice on their website on September 9:

Today, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) announces a draft work plan for the eGovernment Interest Group, whose mission is to document, advocate, coordinate and communicate best practices, solutions and approaches to improve the interface between citizens and government through effective use of Web standards. The draft charter, in review by the W3C community until the end of September, focuses on two topics: Open Government Data (OGD), and Education and Outreach. In line with its anticipated focus on Open Government Data, the group also announces today a first draft of Publishing Open Government Data, which provides step-by-step guidelines for putting government data on the Web. Sharing data according to these guidelines enables greater transparency; delivers more efficient public services; and encourages greater public and commercial use and re-use of government information. Learn more about the W3C eGovernment Activity.

[hat tip DB/eCitizen]

USA.gov has assembled links to information on the September 11, 2001 memorials, ceremonies, and history at 9/11 Commemorations and Information.

President Obama has issued a proclamation, Patriot Day and National Day of Service Remembrance, 2009. Also from the White House, to Congress: notice of continuation of the national emergency with respect to the terrorist threat, and a message from the President regarding the emergency declared with respect to the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

By remembering, we honor those who lost their lives in the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001.

It is no surprise that plenty of people have been saving up their big announcements for the Gov 2.0 Summit. The OpenID Foundation, for example, used the conference venue to announce that they will be collaborating with the U.S. General Services Administration to test OpenID at several federal agencies, including the National Institutes of Health. For more information, see:

• OpenID press release, 9 September 2009
• OpenID and Open Government home page
• OpenID in Government FAQ
• Open Identity for Open Government Explained, from Identity Woman blog

The House Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing on "Competition and Commerce in Digital Books" at 10 a.m. tomorrow, September 10. The hearing will be webcast; the link is on the committee's hearings calendar page.

ALA has some information available on its site. See:
Library Associations submit testimony... and the ALA Google Book Settlement page.

The Sunlight Foundation announced the winners of their "Apps for America 2: The Data.gov Challenge" at the O'Reilly/techweb Gov 2.0 Expo Showcase in DC yesterday. The web applications were to be built with data available from the U.S. Data.gov site. And the prizes go to...

First prize: DataMasher.org. Combine and compare government data at the state level.

Second prize: GovPulse. Making Federal Register access easier.

Third prize: ThisWeKnow.org. Find government info by zip code.

Prize for best data visualization: QuakeSpotter.org. Global view of earthquakes with links to quake-related tweets.

Get complete information from Sunlight's press release.

The one-day Gov 2.0 Expo is over, and the two-day Gov 2.0 Summit (with bold face names) is in progress. They are tweeting up a storm over at the Hyatt, using the hashtag #gov2s.
[Update: They are using the #g2s tag, too.]

I will blog more later on how the Gov 2.0 Expo went.

Actually, it is just a 2 min 30 sec video bringing the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) to the little screen. Washington Post Federal Eye blogger Ed O'Keefe posted his video story Tracking Unemployment Statistics on September 4. It features footage of real BLS employees talking about how the stats are compiled for the monthly Employment Situation release. For action shots, the video captures real BLS employees (or extras?) walking between their office and the Union Station metro stop.

BLS has a less visual but much more detailed webpage on the topic, Monthly Employment Situation Report: Quick Guide to Methods and Measurement Issues.

September 7, 2009 is Labor Day in the U.S., where it is celebrated by not laboring. It's Friday noon on the East Coast, and already I see the drop-off in emails and tweets. Get the facts from:

Labor Day Facts for Features from the Census Bureau

Labor Day press packet from the Labor Department