The current releases are Context HTTP Headers, GovDelivery and NodeEmbed.

According to stories on Nextgov and Federal Computer Week, the GSA had a number of other legal concerns about the standard terms and conditions of these services, including problems with indemnification clauses, liability limits, and endorsements, which led it to enter negotiations with these services. Also, a lot of the standard agreements call for dispute resolutions by state courts, while for government agencies, federal law has to apply.

It is important to note that these new agreements only cover the free services offered by these companies. The GSA is also looking into expanding these agreements to a wider range of social media services.

A number of federal agencies, like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention or the Library of Congress already use services like Twitter, Facebook, and Flickr. To do so, however, these agencies either needed special waivers, or they negotiated terms directly with these services. Some of these initiatives have been very successful. Pictures from the Library of Congress, for example, have been viewed over 15 million times.

Library of Congress on iTunes

In addition, the Library of Congress today announced that it will begin to share more of its content on YouTube and, as podcasts, through Apple's iTunes. This initiative will launch in the next few weeks.

Engaging the Public

We are glad to see that the GSA has now removed some of the major stumbling blocks that stopped a large number of government agencies from using social media sites. Now we just hope that these agencies will also use these services to actually engage with citizens.

Once registered on the site Open for Questions, it looks like you can search for questions, vote on questions that are already listed, and submit your own. As it stands right now, the trend definitely seems to point to more voting for existing questions over new questions being asked. At the top of each topic area there is a new (random?) question along with the highest-voted questions in descending order.

The site also keeps a tally of the number of questions and votes that you cast. You can go back and revisit those with links provided on the left if you want to change your vote or just re-visit the questions you voted for. Finally, it appears that each submitter is a hyperlink, so if you see a question that is particularly challenging, you can click on the submitter's name and see if they have any other questions in other topic areas.

You only have a couple of days to get your questions and votes in, so hurry on over to Open for Questions and get yourself registered. You may even hear your question being read by President Obama next Thursday!

Update: Commenter Baratunde let us know the software driving the site is called Google Moderator. Taking a look at his earlier blog post on the transition; the software does look remarkably similar. Thanks, Baratunde!]]> Discuss]]> http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/holy_cow_the_white_house_has_a_digg_clone.php http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/holy_cow_the_white_house_has_a_digg_clone.php News Tue, 24 Mar 2009 16:58:56 -0800 Phil Glockner Few topics are galvanizing the American public right now like the stimulus bill and how the stimulus money will be spent. ShovelWatch is a joint project of not-for-profit news organization ProPublica, PRI's The Takeaway, and WNYC Radio that plans to track the "stimulus from bills to building." ShovelWatch currently aggregates the best stories about the stimulus bill from all three sites and will feature more original reporting from citizens in the future. The site also features some of the most informative infographics about the stimulus bill.

Crowdsourcing

Maybe the most interesting aspect of ShovelWatch, however, is that it plans to engage citizen reporters to track how the stimulus money will be spent in their local communities. Essentially, the site plans to crowdsource the coverage of the stimulus plan.

Besides its focus on content from The Takeaway, ProPublica, and WNYC, ShovelWatch also tracks stories about the Stimulus Bill on other news sites and features a nice list of resources in its sidebar.

With Recovery.gov, the government has obviously created its own site for tracking the stimulus bill, but Recovery.gov doesn't currently feature as much in-depth information as ShovelWatch (the 'announcements on the site haven't been updated since the middle of last week) and its focus is more on providing a high-level overview and not on tracking local developments.

In the past, we also chided the White House for seemingly giving preferential treatment to YouTube over other video streaming services, but it looks like privacy concerns were the main reason for this weekend's switch. Because Google uses long-term tracking cookies whenever somebody watches a video, the White House's web site was breaking the federal government's strict rules about using cookies on government sites - at least until the White House issued itself an exemption from these rules.

As Chris Soghoian notes, the timing of this move is somewhat odd, as YouTube just rolled out a new feature called delayed cookies, which lets those who embed a video decide if they want to allow Google to set a non-session cookie when others are watching the embedded video. However, it seems like this move came just a bit too late for the White House.

Of course, the White House will continue to post the video addresses on YouTube as well, but thanks to this new solution, the White House website will not set a cookie on your machine every time you play an embedded video anymore.

New Player

Even though YouTube is the de-facto standard for web video today, visitors to the White House web site won't have to miss out on most of YouTube's most compelling features. The new player allows for videos to be embedded or to be downloaded as an MP4 file. Videos can also be played back in full-screen mode and feature captions in English and Spanish. Interestingly, the player now also features a new link: 'also available here,' which currently points to the White House's page on Vimeo. While this is nice, it would also be nice if this link actually pointed to the wide range of services that the White House uploads the weekly address to. Another complaint we have is that the new embeds now automatically start playing whenever a page is opened, without the option to turn this off.

The goverati includes not only government employees, but also people from think tanks, trade publications, and non-profits. And it includes high-profile thinkers outside of the government who have an interest in a more open, transparent, and efficient government; people such as Joe Trippi, Craig Newmark, and Tim O'Reilly. Using formal and informal social networks, the goverati is networking, sharing information, and changing how parts of the government interact with each other and with citizens.

About a week ago, President Obama issued a memo on this very topic. The memo, which affects all Executive Branch employees, has three main pillars: government should be more transparent, participatory, and collaborative. Social software will be part of an overall strategy to make this happen, spearheaded by the CTO, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), and the General Services Administration (GSA). The naming of a "New Media" czar, Macon Phillips, will no doubt push the process along and keep branches well informed.

There are many barriers to this kind of change, so many they would be overwhelming to list. But the changes that are happenening are being covered by the mainstream press, and they are being enacted mainly by -- you guessed it -- the goverati.

Case in point: webmasters. Numerous policies and customs restrict the government's use of things like commercial websites to host video and cookies to track visitors. Insiders from across the government have written a number of white papers that explain the problems (without using jargon) and outline reasonable solutions (here's one of those white papers).

Former CIO of the Department of Defense, Dr. Linton Wells II, often comments to me that battles in government are often won by the most persistent. And the goverati are certainly persistent. It knows that momentum and timing are on its side, and it is pressing its agenda on Washington.

But changing the government is not like changing Apple Computer. President Obama issuing a directive is not the same as Steve Jobs issuing one. It simply doesn't work that way, for all kinds of reasons. To change government, you must be persistent, have a hook, and know when and how to leverage connections and power to "muscle" change. And there are usually competing factions, outside interests, political seasons, etc.; it's a very delicate business.

But interestingly, just as the goverati is fighting for a more transparent, participatory, and collaborative government, it is also leveraging the social tools it loves so much to become a body more powerful than the sum of its parts. The informal Government 2.0 social network GovLoop was developed by a DHS employee in his spare time; in a few months, it has surged to over 5000 members. Intelink, the intelligence community's internal social network and information hub, is awash in blogs and other communication about the topic. Events are sprouting up everywhere, most notably non-profit ones planned by insiders and advertised primarily by word of mouth.

The Sunlight Foundation, which uses the power of the Internet to shine light on the interplay of money, lobbying, and government, is hosting an unconference in late February called Transparency Camp, in which open-government advocates from all walks of life (tech, policy, non-profit, etc.) can talk across organizational and party lines in a casual atmosphere about new strategies for goverment transparency. It is sold out. This is exactly the kind of event you can expect the goverati in Washington and elsewhere to be holding in the next year as we transform President Obama's memo into a reality within government.

Closer to home, three partners and I have recently established the Government 2.0 Club, modeled on Social Media Club. Government 2.0 Club will bring together thought leaders in government, academia, and industry from across the country to explore how social media and Web 2.0 technologies can create a more transparent, participatory, and collaborative government. Local "Clubs" will hopefully also sprout up to discuss issues specific to them. And the first Government 2.0 Camp is happening in Washingston in late March.

The excitement over new social technologies has not abated in Washington. Change is indeed on the way. The intriguing part is the mechanism by which it is happening. By using these social tools to network and share information among themselves, the goverati is helping to spread the use of these very tools throughout the government.

Dr. Mark Drapeau is a biological scientist, government consultant, and author. He has a B.S. and Ph.D. in animal behavior, conducted postdoctoral research on complex genomic and neural systems, and has published writing in Science, Nature, Genome Research, American Scientist, the New York Times, the Washington Times, and other venues.

Powered by Newsgator

USA.gov chose Newsgator as its technology provider for this service. While we have had our doubts about the sustainability of enterprise RSS services, this is definitely a nice win for a company that we would definitely like to see succeed. Because of this integration with Newsgator's services, you can also easily put a widget with relevant government information on your own site.

Last week, we criticized the Obama administration (and others like Allen Stern and Chris Soghoian have done so before us) for giving preferential treatment to Google. While the technology at the White House is apparently not quite up to par, the federal government in the U.S. should be able to stream videos through its own service at this point without making YouTube its default online video service.

We more than appreciate the fact that the Obama administration is trying to be far more transparent and open than any of its predecessors. However, giving a commercial entity this special treatment simply doesn't feel right.

As CNET also points out, the statement on the White House privacy policy that you can download the videos directly from YouTube without YouTube ever setting a cookie is simply wrong.

Here is the full text of the relevant part of the privacy policy (note that the link in the first paragraph is not valid):

The federal government has guidelines for the use of persistent cookies available at http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/memoranda/m03-22.html#20. The goals of the guidelines are to enable the useful functioning of federal websites while protecting individual privacy.

For videos that are visible on WhiteHouse.gov, a 'persistent cookie' is set by third party providers when you click to play a video.  (We may experience some engineering difficulties as the new Whitehouse.gov is posted and reviewed.  We intend, however, to fully enforce the above provisions as soon as possible.  If you are experiencing any difficulties, please contact us.)

This persistent cookie is used by YouTube to help maintain the integrity of video statistics. A waiver has been issued by the White House Counsel's office to allow for the use of this persistent cookie.

If you would like to view a video without the use of persistent cookies, a link to download the video file is typically provided just below the video.

Whitehouse.gov was originally launched in October 1994 during the first Clinton administration. However, the earliest version of whitehouse.gov held in the Internet Archive Wayback Machine is dated December 27, 1996.

At that time, whitehouse.gov - which no doubt looked just fine in Mosaic - was rather sparse and, ironically, Google-like, providing a search function that allowed users to find Presidential press releases, radio addresses, photos, and Web pages.

By mid-1997, the site had abandoned its search functionality in favor of a list of hypertext links. Available resources included the aforementioned press releases and radio addresses, as well as executive orders.

For context, the site also provided links to The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution of the United States of America.

Glimmers of Change

As the site supported the second Clinton administration and weathered the infamous whitehouse.com debacle - where visitors seeking the President found an NSFW adult site instead - it remained fairly static.

In late 1998, however, whitehouse.gov went through another major change - this time opting for more of an early Yahoo! aesthetic. In an effort to provide more information to the growing number of people on the Web, the site began to add more and more links to information sources, including an "Interactive Citizens' Handbook," "Commonly Requested Federal Services," and breaking news. This version of whitehouse.gov also marked the appearance of "White House for Kids," a section of the site focused on explaining the presidency to the younger set and "helping young people become more active and informed citizens."

Regrettably, this version of the site also featured the "waving flag" animated gif which would continue to plague Web pages across the United States for years to come.

Navigating Whitehouse.gov

As the administration of George W. Bush took residence at whitehouse.gov in 2001, the site began to show signs of more structure. Most notably, introducing a left navigation for accessing static content, a design choice that opened the main page up to more specific and timely links. This version of the site also marks the introduction of accessibility at whitehouse.gov, allowing users to bypass the image-based site for a text-only version.

Focusing on the Latest News

Following the terrorist attacks in September 2001, whitehouse.gov went through a substantial design change that would remain in place for most the Bush presidency. Over the next few years, the home page of the post 9/11 version of the site grew more and more focused on breaking news summaries, current threat levels, and areas of focus.

Throughout this version, the navigation structure became more and more complex, introducing a more detailed left navigation as well as a top navigation structure. Also of note, Spanish-speaking users were given the opportunity to access some of the information in their native tongue.

By 2003, whitehouse.gov began to resemble a modern news portal, providing short snippets of information with links to the "full story," informational graphics, and the introduction of "Ask the White House," an online form which allowed citizens to "submit questions to Bush administration officials."

The design of whitehouse.gov remained fairly similar - with minor tweaks - throughout 2006. The only addition of note was the opportunity to subscribe to an RSS feed.

Major Design Overhaul

No doubt feeling the pressure from the growing maturity of Web design and the Web-browsing public, the Bush administration launched its last major redesign in 2007.

The last version of the site for the Bush presidency abandoned the portal feel for a more aesthetic presentation of information and links. This version of whitehouse.gov also featured a simplified top navigation structure and a more prominent search function. The RSS feed was moved the top of the page along with podcasts.

Obama Takes Over

And that brings us to 12:01 EST on January 20, 2009 when - riding the momentum of change.gov, Obama's transition site - Macon Phillips, the newly appointed New Media Director for the Obama administration, introduced the new whitehouse.gov.

With an obvious nod to both the latest communications methods and the latest aesthetic, the new site offers a blog with a conversational tone, a number of RSS feeds (NOTE: We've added all of the feeds - six at last count - into one whitehouse.gov RSS feed, if you'd like to follow it), and it validates to XHTML 1.0 Transitional.

One noticeably absent component - at least in our cursory overview of the site - is the Intense Debate comment feature of which we had been so fond on the change.gov site.

What's Next for Whitehouse.gov?

So there you have it. A short visual history of the home page of the President of the US. Having managed transitions through through three leaders - not to mention Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 - the site continues to improve the communications between the Executive Branch and its constituency.

If you're interested in more versions of the site, please visit the Wayback Machine.

What's next? That's anyone's guess. But you've likely got some ideas on how whitehouse.gov could be improved. What features would you suggest for the next version? We'd love to hear them.

Ross Mayfield (SocialText) and Michael Pusateri (Disney) are discussing using SocialText (and blogs and wikis in general) in business. Michael works for the television/ABC arm of Disney, and they're using SocialText. He has a great point: how do you get users to accept the new methodologies? Simple. Don't tell them. Don't make a big deal about trying some revolutionary new tool. Just train them and let them discover things like why email doesn't make a great file system, but a weblog is another story. They're also using Newsgator with Outlook to help people aggregate and survey what's going on on all the Disney weblogs. Told the users: "We're going to put some stuff into Outlook so you don't have to go check the Web pages anymore." Response: cool! No discussion needed about the joys/promise of RSS, etc.
(emphasis mine)

It's the same kind of approach that Yahoo! is taking with their new RSS services.