Fed Faces Don't Satisfy the Public
10/30/09 02:02 pm ET
When ForeSee Results released its third-quarter e-government satisfaction scores this week, the big news was that public satisfaction with federal Web sites had reached a record high.>>
TECHNOLOGY AND THE BUSINESS OF GOVERNMENT
10/30/09 02:02 pm ET
When ForeSee Results released its third-quarter e-government satisfaction scores this week, the big news was that public satisfaction with federal Web sites had reached a record high.>>
10/30/09 01:52 pm ET
Another day, another cybersecurity bill. Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Joe Lieberman, ID-Conn., previewed the bullet points of a measure he plans to introduce later this year, which includes procurement reform that requires vendors to comply with security standards when selling technology solutions to federal agencies. >>
10/29/09 02:56 pm ET
Recovery.gov on Friday will sport a few improvements and a lot more offerings, but perhaps one piece of valuable information will be missing: the demographics of the people receiving money.>>
10/28/09 02:49 pm ET
With the Virginia general election only a week away, residents of the commonwealth looking for voting information might find one of Google's latest gadgets useful.>>
10/26/09 03:39 pm ET
A few weeks ago, the Wall Street Journal published a piece about how e-mail's reign as the king of online communication is over. Author Jessica Vascellaro didn't decree the death of e-mail, she just argued the constant stream of updates social media services like Facebook and Twitter provide are more in sync with today's permanently plugged-in approach to the Web. >>
10/26/09 02:43 pm ET
While the administration had hoped to issue a long-awaited open government directive before the end of the month, sources close to the process expect that it will be out within the next couple weeks. >>
10/23/09 07:15 pm ET
The White House on Friday invited private equity fund managers to submit proposals for the establishment of a fund that will invest in technology access in countries with large Muslim populations. >>
10/22/09 12:27 pm ET
Early-bird entries for the Webbies, an international contest often called the Emmys of the Internet, are being accepted until Oct. 30, and I am really hoping a number of federal Web managers are planning on entering their sites.>>
10/21/09 05:43 pm ET
Something you hear quite often when covering government is the concern among top managers that some, or sometimes many, federal employees want executives who are trying to change government to fail. Most often, it's not politically driven. The change involves business processes and strategic shifts, ideas that are not ideologically spawned or driven. Mangers I have talked to say these employees just don't want to change the way they have worked for years, or they see the change as a threat to their control over a specific detailed process or policy, or they fear the change threatens their livelihood. >>
10/21/09 09:28 am ET
Last month I reported that GovLoop, the unofficial "Facebook to the Feds," was acquired by GovDelivery, partly so founder Steve Ressler could devote all his time to nurturing and expanding his pet project. Yesterday Steve sent me some news: He's made the first addition to the GovLoop team and it's someone who should be familiar to the Gov 2.0 crowd. Andrew Krzmarzick, formerly senior project coordinator at the USDA Graduate School.>>
10/20/09 01:29 pm ET
Usability guru Jakob Nielsen and his team at the Nielsen Norman Group recently released a research report on the design and usability of social messaging and RSS feeds. In the outline of the findings Nielsen posted on his Web site, he bluntly states, "we have a long way to go to improve the usability of social network messaging and RSS feeds.">>
10/20/09 11:58 am ET
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano shot down the prospect of a cabinet-level information technology position during an online video address on Tuesday.>>
10/19/09 05:07 pm ET
Federal employees conceived 38,484 ways to cut the federal budget during a month-long contest that ended last week, Office of Management and Budget officials said on Monday.>>
10/19/09 02:08 pm ET
Google Analytics Evangelist Avinash Kaushik detailed how to measure the success of a government Web site on Google's Public Sector Blog last week. And his first instruction was not to turn to any of the tools Google offers in its analytics toolset. >>
10/19/09 01:53 pm ET
The board overseeing stimulus spending has provided Internet users with a bulk download of all federal contract results, after transparency activists griped that Recovery.gov's data was hard to analyze. The new data set, labeled "AllNationwideContracts.zip," is a single spreadsheet listing the status, location, funds awarded and jobs created for projects across all 50 states.>>
10/16/09 04:50 pm ET
On Thursday, the Recovery Board published the first spending reports on Recovery.gov from companies that received stimulus contracts before Sept. 30. The resulting media attention has the White House scrambling to explain why so few jobs have been created after spending so much taxpayer money.>>
10/16/09 04:03 pm ET
The Obama administration has posted three blogs to WhiteHouse.gov on cybersecurity since the sixth annual National Cybersecurity Awareness Month officially kicked off Oct. 1. The first post, by John Brennan, read more like a marketing letter, emphasizing that "government, industry and the individual computer user must all play a role in securing our information networks and data.">>
10/15/09 03:45 pm ET
My story on Thursday about the creation of go.usa.gov, the official government link shortener, is probably not going to dominate the headlines on the day when Recovery.gov is rolling out the first wave of recipient-reported data. But it's a small example of the type of innovation that can only help the government increase its ability to serve the American public online.>>
10/14/09 05:33 pm ET
We hear a lot about cyberattacks, but here's an "oops" moment that hurts:>>
10/14/09 11:24 am ET
The Homeland Security Department will spend $88 million in Recovery Act funds on scanning technology that will be used to inspect commercial goods crossing U.S. borders.>>
10/13/09 04:20 pm ET
While our focus at Nextgov is mainly on information technology in the executive branch, I'd like to take a moment to mark the end of an era in the legislative branch's IT saga. On Friday, the House of Representatives decommissioned its last mainframe, which had been in place at the Ford Office Building since 1997.>>
10/09/09 04:47 pm ET
In my story today on the State Department's grant program to increase the availability of social media and online learning tools in the Middle East, George Washington University professor Henry Farrell calls the program a "sophisticated and interesting approach" to 21st century diplomacy and democracy-building. Given how the events following the Iranian election in June captured the world's attention online, I think most can agree that there is a great deal of untapped potential in social networking tools like Twitter and Facebook, particularly when it comes to increasing citizen engagement.>>
10/08/09 05:06 pm ET
Hey, this could be a great idea: Congressional committees could post links on their Web sites to something called live webcasts of Hill hearings, allowing the press and public alike to watch and listen virtually from their homes or offices -- without spending time fighting traffic or contributing to greenhouse emissions.>>
10/07/09 10:29 am ET
Colleague Marc Armbinder posted yesterday an item on his Atlantic Politics blog that the intelligence community is pulling the plug on uGov, "one of its earliest efforts at cross-agency collaboration," Armbinder wrote.>>
10/06/09 03:32 pm ET
The Federal Register is out with an executive order, first announced last week, that prohibits federal employees from text messaging while driving. It pressures companies with government business to "refrain" from distracted driving, too.>>
10/05/09 10:45 pm ET
Just how much should leaders know about technology? Plenty, according to retired Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni, president of UCLA's Center for Middle East Development and author of "Leading the Charge: Lessons from the Battlefield to the Boardroom." Zinni, who gave one of the keynote presentations at Government Executive's Excellence in Government conference in Washington on Monday, said: "IT has changed the way we lead. ... If you don't grasp the technology and how to use it ... you will be left behind.>>
10/02/09 05:24 pm ET
Yesterday market research firm INPUT released their list of the Top 20 Federal Contracting Opportunities for 2010 and the company's senior vice president of research and analysis services, Kevin Plexico, was kind enough to give us a preview of the list ahead of a Tuesday webinar introducing the list.>>
10/01/09 01:39 pm ET
To kick off the fiscal year, the Office of Management and Budget on Thursday is prodding its employees to become fiscally fit inside and out. All OMB staffers were given the option of receiving a pedometer for recording their physical activity online and virtually racing with their colleagues. The top pacer each month earns a free lunch with OMB Director Peter Orszag -- and the most athletic OMB division receives a healthy happy hour. >>
