Courtesy of the Atlantic Wire, here's video of Michelle Obama officially joining the Twitterverse:

The White House on Friday released a status report on the Obama administration's open government initiative, claiming credit for a number of advances but acknowledging that more needs to be done to make federal operations more transparent.

"Some critics have alleged that the administration has not done enough to create a more open government, and that much work remains," the document states. "They are right; notwithstanding the measurable and undeniable progress made on all the administration's major initiatives, still more work is necessary."

The bulk of the report, however, centers on documenting progress. The open government effort, it says, has proceeded on several fronts:

• On his first day in office, President Obama issued an order instructing agencies to release more information under the Freedom of Information Act. In fiscal 2010, agencies made full disclosures for nearly 56 percent of FOIA requests, a 6 percent increase over the previous year.
• By the end of 2010, agencies had developed comprehensive open government plans, as required by a 2009 administration directive.
• Agencies have made more than 389,000 data sets available via the Data.gov platform.
• The administration has boosted spending transparency through reporting efforts on Recovery.gov, USASpending.gov and IT.usaspending.gov.
• The National Archives and Records Admnistration has taken steps to implement Executive Order 13526, which requires stricter standards for classifying information. Agencies reduced personnel authorized to classify documents by 7 percent in 2010.
• The White House has made the president's and vice president's daily schedules available on its website.

The rest of 2011 and 2012, the report says, will see "continued progress" by agencies on open gov initiatives.

Steven VanRoekel, a former Microsoft executive, will be named the next federal chief information officer, the New York Times reports.

VanRoekel served as managing director of the Federal Communications Commission starting in 2009. He currently is on detail as an executive director at the Agency for International Development.

He will succeed Vivek Kundra, who announced in June that he would leave his post.

More on this story as it develops.

Steven VanRoekel, a former Microsoft executive, will be named the next federal chief information officer, the New York Times reports.

VanRoekel has been managing director of the Federal Communications Commission. He will succeed Vivek Kundra, who announced in June that he would leave his post.

More news on this story as it develops.

Vivek Kundra, the first-ever federal chief information officer, is leaving his post in August, the Office of Management and Budget announced Thursday.

Kundra will take a fellowship at Harvard University.

In a statement posted on the OMB blog, OMB Director Jacob Lew said:

When President Obama appointed Vivek Kundra as the first U.S. CIO, he said, "Vivek Kundra will bring a depth of experience in the technology arena and a commitment to lowering the cost of government operations to this position. As Chief Information Officer, he will play a key role in making sure our government is running in the most secure, open, and efficient way possible."

When he began at the White House, he brought with him the promise of good ideas and a hard-charging style focused on getting things done, necessary qualities to tackle the difficult issues facing Federal IT - an aging infrastructure with rising operating costs, too many major projects failing to deliver, and increasing vulnerability to outside threats. Two and a half years after joining the Administration, Vivek has delivered on that promise.  He has cracked down on wasteful IT spending, saved $3 billion in taxpayer dollars; moved the government to the cloud; strengthened the cybersecurity posture of the nation while making it more open, transparent, and participatory.  His work has been replicated across the world from 16 countries that have deployed the data.gov model to tap into the ingenuity of their people to multiple countries that have deployed the IT dashboard to save money.

 I want to congratulate him on his move to Harvard in mid-August to serve as a joint fellow at the Kennedy School and the Berkman Center for Internet and Society.  We are planning for a smooth transition, continuing these remarkable gains in changing the way the Federal government manages IT and Vivek's impact on cutting waste and making government work better for the American people will continue to be felt well beyond his departure from Federal service.