Apps for America competition launches - cash prizes for best mash ups of government data

In conjunction with the Data.gov launch, Sunlight Labs in partnership with Google has launched the Apps for America 2 competition to find the best mash ups using US Federal government data.

Over US$20,000 is being given away for open source online applications using the Federal datasets at Data.gov based on the following criteria:

1. Transparency: Does the app help citizens see things they couldn't see before the app existed?
   
   
2. Permanence: Will the app be usable over a long period of time? Does the idea have survivability?
   
   
3. Design & Visualization: Does the app look great? Does the app visualize data in a new and interesting way?

The UK government holds similar competitions.

I wonder what innovation the Australian government could unlock if it made public data available in machine-readable formats, then held its own competition.

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Data.gov launches - allows public to mash up US federal data

The US government has taken the first step towards meeting President Obama's pledge to make US taxpayer funded information freely available online in reusable formats late last week with the launch of the Data.gov website.

At launch the site featured dozens of datasets from around 20 Federal agencies ready to be used by the public, commercial and NGO sectors in mash-up applications and services.

The public is also able to suggest additional information to be made available through the site.

I am an extremely big fan of making public sector data available online (where there are no security issues), particularly when the data is readily available for online reuse through APIs, XML, RSS, KML/KMZ and similar machine-readable formats.

A speech by the US Federal CIO, Vivek Kundra launched the site and made the purpose extremely clear in the video below. Kundra expects more than 240,000 datasets to eventually be available online, per the post at Governing People by George Fahey, Data.gov opens.

The post also comments that,

The first applications built on this data has already arrived (see FBI Fugitive Concentration).

This demonstrates how quickly the public can make good use of public information when it is made public.

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Australian Bureau of Statistics launches 'βetaWorks' blog

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has launched a blog that allows the public to comment on ongoing development of the ABS website.

Named ABS βetaWorks, the site is to my knowledge the first of its kind in the world for the public arena.

It features a number of improvements that the ABS is working on in the online arena, with the ability to add comments or suggestions via a moderated feature.

It also allows the public to suggest further improvements to the site.

The ABS has several years of experience in the blogging area, with its Statistically Speaking blog.

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Follow US political activity online - over 130 federal members on Twitter

I've previously discussed how actively the US has taken up Twitter as a communications tool in government circles - as have the UK, Canada, Israel and several other countries.

Looking at the website Who Politicians Tweet, there are now more than 130 US Federal politicians using Twitter, or around 24% of all 535 elected members (Reps 435, Senate 100).

In Australia I can only find twelve Federal members using Twitter, or about 5% of the combined 226 elected members (Reps 150, Senate 76).

However more Australian councils are adopting the service - with more than 20 now actively using Twitter, up from only three a few months ago.

You can see a full list of Aussie politicians and political parties on Twitter at Oz Pollie Tweeters.

From my commercial experience I have normally considered Australia as running about two years behind the US for the online channel. I am curiously watching to see if this also holds true in the public arena.

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Australian internet usage 20% greater than TV - Nielsen

I've just come across a media release from Nielsen (PDF) from March this year indicating that internet use by Australian internet users reached 16.1 hours per week in 2008, soaring ahead of TV at 12.9 viewing hours per week (radio sits at 8.8 hours).

This suggests that the average Australian internet user is spending 20% more time online than they do in front of the television - although there is also a high instance of multi-channelling - 61% of Australians watch TV and use the internet at the same time and 50% listen to the radio while surfing the net.

Nielsen's media consumption chart is below.



Also this morning the Sydney Morning Herald is reporting that Google is on target to crack $1 billion in revenue in Australia - a larger revenue than the entire Australian commercial radio segment, or magazines and outdoor advertising markets.

With the new financial year approaching it might be a very good time to reweigh communications strategies and budgets to ensure that they are being spent on the medium where Australians are spending most of their leisure time.

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