Let's Refudiate Twitter?

Sarah Palin illustrates one of the pitfalls of Web 2.0--you tweet a new word, like "refudiate" and you get mocked.

Fact of the Day: Indonesians on Facebook

The third leading nation in use of Facebook is Indonesia, with 22.7 million account. From NYTimes article

Feds Need Their Cookies

Apparently a number of Federal agencies have gotten around the OMB ban on using cookies on their websites. I may be wrong but it seems to me in the early days of browsers (say 1995-2000) there was lots of concern over cookies.  Since then I believe the concern has subsided, which fits my general preconception that new things cause anxiety and the media tends to exaggerate such concerns (at least when they aren't failing to notice the new).  Cookies seem so yesterday, given today's Facebook and similar Web 2.0 stuff.

Whatever Happened to Employee Suggestions

That's my reaction to the use of Web 2.0 techniques to elicit ideas from employees.  Back in the olden days, when typewriters existed and were made of wood, ASCS had an employee suggestion program--write up an idea, send it up the line, to some near-sighted bureaucrat who would turn it down with all the reasons why it wouldn't work, was too expensive, was inappropriate, wasn't invented in DC, etc. etc.

A few suggestions were approved--but that was tricky.  Personnel had a formula for determining the award amount for approving a suggestion.  Something that would apply nationwide was worth more than something just for a state or commodity.  So you had to figure out how to slot an approved suggestion into the mix with other suggestions so as to get an award amount that made sense.

One that was approved was for field employees to use the IBM data handling utilities  (originally it was the Data File Utility, then upgraded to Query/36.) on the System/36  to do things without waiting upon DC and the Kansas City programmers. We had a struggle to get the right award amount approved for that.  So it's nice to see DC is still occasionally using the software, even 20 years later.

USDA Blog Process Needs Work

Today, I believe, is August 26. Today the USDA blog posted this. Vilsack proclaimed the community garden week August 6.

(I'd suspect this is a symptom of the fact the blog isn't integrated into the USDA institution yet. It takes a while to make such changes.)

Field Manuals Via Wikipedia

The NY Times has an article on the Army using wikipedia software to rewrite some field manuals.

(One of the biggest surprises of my brief and involuntary Army career was the extent to which the Army had manuals, though for me mostly technical manuals on generators, etc.)

I'm torn:

• on the one hand I like the concept. Wikipedia mostly has good to excellent quality in their articles, so it is possible. I like the idea of spreading the workload and getting the input from diverse sources. (Note my prior post on the burden FSA field offices when their directives are dispersed.)
• on the other hand, having participated in the open government experiments of OSTP, I'm dubious over the practicality. After all, Wikipedia has been around for years and survived some rough times. They've had a learning curve, and still have issues. I'm suspicious a high-level bureaucrat will see wikipedia software as a silver bullet and will kill the project when it turns out to be a long hard slog up the hill.
  

Problem With the USDA Blog

I noted the new USDA blog. It's always nice to see my former co-workers moving ahead into the sunlit upland meadows of Web 2.0. But a warning--there seems to be a glitch. If you comment on a post, as I did, and check the box to be informed of subsequent comments, as I did, you will receive the unmoderated comments, as I do, which include a bunch of spam mentioning viagra, etc.

There's no email address for the blog to notify them of this problem. One place where transparency is not a priority in the Obama administration. :-(

USDA Starts Blogging

On June 25th Secretary Vilsack initiated the USDA blog. Don't know how I missed it for so long.

Maybe it's because USDA never issued a press release on it. It sort of looks as if the impetus was the Recovery Act, not a USDA initiative on its own. Whatever the cause, I'm glad to see it. Always happy when high level program people show an interest in process and technology.

[Updated: I also see the CIO of USDA, Chris Smith, started a blog. But he has only one post and no comments, whereas Vilsack's blog has a reasonable number of posts, and a few comments.]

The Wingnuts Strike Again

The people who believe Obama is not an American citizen have struck Open Gov.

It's reminiscent of flame wars on Usenet or the problems wikipedia has had in the past: people who believe passionately in oddball causes can overwhelm. Not sure how one goes about moderating their impact so government can use Web 2.0.

The Wikipedia Revolution and Culture

Just finished "The Wikipedia Revolution", by Andrew Lih. Before I get to the most interesting part of it, let me complain. The type face used is a sans serif one which I found particularly bothersome. Way back in the early 70's I was researching replacements for our IBM MT/ST word processors, which got me into CRT displays and legibility which, since I tend to digress, surprising as that may be to, got me into reading about type faces. This was way before Postscript and other computer-generated fonts. It seems the function of "serifs" is to help guide the eye, and the older you get the more guidance you need.

Anyhow, the book is good, although I was vaguely aware of some of the history. What was most interesting was his discussion of the way culture and history impact the structure and operations of the Japanese (lots more anonymity), German (more rule-oriented and concerned with quality, not quantity), and Chinese (although the spoken languages differ, there's one written language, except there's actually three systems) wikipedias.

Limits of Gov. 2.0

GovLoop.com is billed as a Social network for Government. (Still don't understand it, but I've added its RSS feed.) There's an interesting post here pointing out the limits of the sort of suggestion system the Obama administration has used, first before inauguration, and now in connection with recovery.gov. The main point is, by exposing ideas for user evaluation as they are posted, you get a big first mover advantage. Once you have 3 digits worth of suggestions, only the oddball like me will scroll through and evaluate. The writer prefers this:

Imagine if the National Dialogue first enabled submission of ideas with examples on an equal basis. Then it enabled a simultaneous consideration with an ability of public comment. Then the ideas were vetted based on the public comment received. And finally, the final ideas were then submitted with an alternative analysis based on meritocracy. The final ideas could credibly be considered by the broader audience, based on merit.

FSA and Texting

Those forward-looking people at FSA are looking at Web 2.0. From a Nextgov post.

Jeff Kerby, Web manager for the Agriculture Department's Farm Service Agency, which provides loans and subsidy payments to farmers, said the agency recently has begun testing how social networking could be used. He and other technology managers at FSA are analyzing how the agency could text the latest crop prices to farmers every morning so they don't have to come into the county office to look up the information. "They're receptive," Kerby said. "It's a matter of getting them used to it."