The danger of permanent internet exclusion to egovernment and Gov 2.0

The internet is increasingly defining the 21st century.

It has become the primary medium used to find and share information, the most commonly used news and entertainment medium and has unleashed an outpouring of creativity which commentators, such as Clay Shirky have described as "the greatest in human history".

Equally there have been pressures to constrain aspects of the internet. Around the world a number of nations are blocking access to certain pages, websites and services - sometimes based on concerns on the appropriateness of content, sometimes due to economic or political pressure.

There have even been attempts, spearheaded by significant copyright holders, to block internet access for significant periods of time - or even permanently - from households or individuals accused of repeated copyright violations.

This last topic is worth debate in a eGovernment and Gov 2.0 context.

As governments shift information, services and engagement activities online there is greater expectation - and hope - that citizens will use the internet to interact with agencies.

By shifting services online governments can cut offices and employ less phone staff.

In a country where all citizens have the right to access the internet this is not an issue. Anyone who can engage online is encouraged to do so and offline government services can be reconfigured to suit audiences who are unable or unwilling to use the internet. Everyone wins.

However what happens in a nation where internet access can be denied to otherwise capable citizens, either for long periods of time or permanently?

What is the commercial impact after television and telephony have migrated to a (for instance) national broadband network? How would this distort these peoples' access to government services? What additional costs (at taxpayer expense) would government be forced to incur to service these people effectively? Does it exclude them from democratic participation or from vital health and welfare information?

I can't see any nation deciding to permanently cut access to an individual or household's telephony services because they used it to make a few abusive calls. Neither can I see any state denying a household access to electricity or water because one resident was convicted several times for growing illicit drugs via a hydroponic system in their bedroom.

However there are real threats emerging around the world that some individuals or households may be permanently excluded from online participation based on accusations, or convictions, for a few minor offenses.


An example is France, which enacted a 'three strikes' law in 2009. Reportedly record companies are now sending 25,000 complaints per day via ISPs to French citizens they are accusing of flouting copyright laws.

Under the law French citizens receive two warnings and can then be disconnected from their ISP and placed on a 'no internet' blacklist - denying them access to the online world, potentially permanently.

While this approach was designed to discourage illegal activity, early indications are that this doesn't appear to have succeeded as piracy may have risen. It also, apparently, has annoyed US law enforcement agencies as it may encourage greater use of freely available, industrial strength, encryption technologies, thereby making it much harder to distinguish between major criminal organisations and file downloaders and hurting law enforcement activities.

This is similar to an often-repeated storyline in Superman comics, when Superman can identify criminals as they are the only ones using lead shielding on their homes to block his X-Ray vision. If everyone used lead shielding, Superman couldn't tell the bad guys from the good guys (there's a future storyline for DC).


Most importantly a 'three strikes and you're off' approach - or equivalent law - risks permanently excluding people from the most important 21st century medium, simply for being accused three times of copyright violation. Arguably, in today's world, that's a much more severe judgement than people receive for multiple murders, rapes or armed robbery.

I don't see the Australian government rushing to embrace a similar approach, however it still raises the question of whether we need to consider internet access as a right at the same level as access to electricity or telephones.

Other nations are considering this as well. Several European countries have already declared internet access a fundamental human right, including France, which places the country in an interesting position.

The European Union (of which France is a member) has rejected a 3-strike law and, as Boing Boing reported, progressive MEPs wrote a set of "Citizens Rights" amendments that established that internet access was a fundamental right that cannot be taken away without judicial review and actual findings of wrongdoing.

As the internet has now moved from a 'nice-to-have' service to a 'must-have' utility for many people, even actual findings of wrongdoing may no longer be sufficient reason to permanently exclude people. In fact this may be legally impossible to enforce anyway, due to public access and mobile services.

Given the potential negative impacts on democratic participation, the ongoing cost to government and the potential commercial and social impacts - should it be possible for a government to legislate, a court to dictate or for ISPs to refuse to connect some citizens to the internet permanently?

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Allow other public servants their own Gov 2.0 and social media journeys

At an event with colleagues last week, I overheard several talking about their surprise at the levels of caution and fear they still encountered amongst various professionals regarding Gov 2.0 and social media.

"It's as if they were still living in the early 1990s," said one. "Some people just don't seem to understand how far technology has advanced, nor the level of work and learning that has gone into social media strategies in the last five years or Gov 2.0 in the last year."

I strongly sympathised with this view. As I have spent a significant share of my waking time in the last fifteen years learning, developing and testing new media strategies and solutions, it can be hard at times to realise that others don't have the same level of experience as me.

One of my most valuable learnings has been that not everyone is at the same point in their Gov 2.0 and social media journey.

Many have been busy 'looking' in one of many different directions - finding them so interesting and fulfilling that they may simply not have noticed what has been going on in other directions - such as in social media or Government 2.0.

Now they have turned their gaze to Gov 2.0 for the first time. They are starting at the beginning and haven't had the same learnings or experience yet.

While it is tempting to try to pour my own experience into these people to help them get up to speed, this is rarely a workable approach. Nor is providing them with a full map of the social media landscape, this can simply scare them into inaction.

Instead they need to travel on their own journey to Gov 2.0 understanding.

The best way those of us with more experience can help is to scout just a little way ahead. Help them see the pitfalls (that they can recognise) and assist them to overcome obstacles they encounter in their path. Occasionally point out branching tracks they may not have the experience to notice but they might like to consider, and allow them to come to you when they have new questions and insights.

Is this a fast way to get people up to speed on Gov 2.0? Not really, but it works. And sometimes they will surprise you with insights far beyond your own ideas or experiences, helping you on your own Gov 2.0 journey.

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Gov 2.0 views from Gartner's Government day

I attended Gartner's Government Day on Monday for their ITXPO Symposium (I was on a panel), and it was very interesting to hear the views expressed about social media.

Below are some of the quotes I recorded from Gartner analysts and senior IT leaders. They are not all verbatim and have been reordered to flow more logically.

• Social media is not about technology, it's about collaboration - the only risk is in ignoring it.
   
• There are 20 exabytes of social media information available online today - it is real, it is not a fad.  It doesn't matter whether you are using social media - you cannot ignore it because your customers use it.
   
• In a world where people can talk to people, as an organisation you had better be believable - traditional PR no longer works.  If you wish to be credible in social media, you have to tell the truth. Black box organisations will not survive.
   
• The public will judge organisations not on whether they make mistakes, they all do, but on how they visibly recover.
   
• Google's PR strategy made mistakes OK, so that customers don't mind. Organisations that try to pretend they don't make mistakes and then attempt to hide their mistakes create huge media attention and serious reputation damage. It is better to be honest and truthful and not create those types of unrealistic expectations.
   
• Bloggers are hugely important public influencers. Organisations no longer control the message, they must influence the influencers. This is an entirely new approach to public relations.
 
• You could allow marketing to lead social media initiatives - but there's a risk it will disappear down a black hole. Organisations need a broader strategic approach. BHP tried all traditional communications approaches with the Gulf oil spill and they didn't work.
   
• If staff want to discuss confidential matters they will  - banning them from Facebook at work doesn't make a different, they will use other channels, like a phone, or their own devices. Secure their communications through training and support, not their technology.
   
• It isn't the right of ICT security to control social media issues - privacy and record-keeping are corporate governance issues.
   
• IT is shirking its responsibility by not providing organisational platforms for online monitoring and engagement. IT needs to be a source of data, information and strategic advice to marketing for social media as it changes.
   
• IT must support and facilitate business to realise social media opportunities. If it doesn't, its role will get smaller and less significant. Twenty years ago ICT stepped back and allowed marketing to run websites, we can't afford to step back to that again.
   
• You should own your own '[organisation] sucks' domain and site. Use it to listen and respond to customer complaints.
   
• Organisations struggle with how to engage via social media - the answer is to listen, rectify issues, contact and invite comment. Imagine a customised 'Tripadvisor.com.au' service where the public could comment on your service and rate you. It may not be far away.
   
• The more layers of management, the more barriers to collaboration and transparency.
   
• If you want to change culture, budget one year per layer of management, for example if you have eight layers of management a single culture change can take eight years (requoted from an ex-Senior Officer).

You may agree with a number of these statements.

However, the comments were not from any 'Social media in Government' workshop.

They were from a 'Social media in the Banking industry' workshop that I attended after my panel to see how the financial industry was addressing Web 2.0 opportunities.

After the workshop I've formed the view that banking is about two to three years behind government in Australia in engaging with social media effectively.

I can see some real shake-up coming to the industry based on several other statements by Gartner analysts:

• Financial services companies are inherently conservative and don't attract innovative people.
   
• The reality is that banking industry runs on opaqueness - it is the only way it can keep the prices high and profits substantial.

The banking sector is facing significant challenges. Regardless of whether its senior leadership wishes to engage via social media or not, their customers, stakeholders and even their staff are using these channels more and more.

Increasingly, banks are seeing the rise of services like Paypal, which the panel said that banks laughed off only a few years ago but now see as a genuine threat to their business.

They are concerned about the risk of Google starting a banking business, as they believe Google has a better reputation and greater capability to be agile.

They are worried about online comparison services, which make it easy for the public to compare banking and insurance rates; and about online services, which offer substitute banking services more conveniently.

In other words, the banks are facing reputation, transparency and agility crises, brought on by a culture that resists change and innovation, at the hands of social media empowered individuals and small, agile, innovative organisations.

Government isn't always slow, conservative or inflexible, particularly compared to large institutional banks.

Maybe, in the public sector, we're doing much better than some people might appreciate.

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We don't need more Gov 2.0 initiatives in Australian government

I'm speaking this afternoon at the Garner Symposium ITXPO 2010 on a panel discussing the spread and success of Government 2.0 initiatives in Australia and a couple of other related topics.

Thinking about it this morning I don't think government in Australia needs more Government 2.0 initiatives.

In fact I don't think we need any at all.

What we actually need is to integrate the use of Government 2.0 tools and techniques in existing government activities to improve their cost-effectiveness over time.

Research
When researching policy or service offerings, public servants should listen to social media channels and engage, where relevant, in robust policy discussions through existing forums, blogs and networks.

Consultation
When consulting an audience, agencies need to collect views by online form - not email - backed by a moderation process and database which allows the agency to rapidly screen and publish submissions. This allows others to reflect on published submissions before submitting their own.

With this information stored in an appropriately tagged database, it then becomes very easy and fast to extract particular themes and ideas, processing the submissions and integrating them into policy documents.

Government can also run, or tap into existing, interest groups via appropriate forums, blogs or even micro-blogs such as twitter to gain insights into a policy proposal.

Prioritisation
When prioritising issues and outcomes, rather than just asking a couple of focus groups for their views, government can run an ideas market, allowing the community to broadly prioritise and comment on issues or goals - providing broader input into the process.

Communication, data services and service development
Rather than relying on outsourced specialist agencies to come up with ideas and executions for communications campaigns or new services, government can ask the community to develop strategies, graphics treatments, applications and other services - or at least submit ideas. Using this approach an enormous number of ideas can be collected in a short time at a relatively low cost (rather than paying an agency for three treatments).

Ongoing communications
Rather than regularly paying large sums of money to access the audiences of traditional media outlets, government can use social media to build its own audiences on key themes and topics. With appropriate community management (yes hire this talent INTO government), agencies can rapidly share information with key groups, ask for feedback and carry on an ongoing relationship - building trust and reducing future costs.

Freeing up data
Government is being increasingly mandated through FOI legislation and the need to get wider scrutiny on data for policy and service delivery purposes to open up its data. Gov 2.0 tools improve this opening up, making data more widely usable and accessible, magnifying the effective benefits.

Internal collaboration and communication
Through introducing social media tools within the firewall, agencies can empower staff to better find others with relevant expertise, collaborate on policies and operational matters, improve internal communication across existing silos (helping to chip at their walls) and provide better outcomes for the Department.


None of these standard government activities - communication, policy development, collaboration, service development and delivery - mystically become 'Gov 2.0 initiatives' if you simply begin applying Gov 2.0 tools and techniques.

However they can become cheaper and faster to deliver, engaging greater numbers of people and delivering better outcomes for the agency, the government and, most importantly, for citizens.

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Getting creative with visualisations in Government sites and documents

Government is the master of the written word. Across Australian governments we probably produce billions of them each year, carefully organised into documents designed to impart knowledge and influence decisions.

If you were to consider a medium-size agency producing, let's estimate, twenty 100 page reports each year, fifty 2-page media releases and 200 4-page minutes, with 200 words per page, that's 580,000 words already - not to mention emails, websites, internal documents, procurements, recruitment processes, forms presentations and all the draft versions produced.

Many of these words are important and necessary - however some might be better communicated graphically. Do we use visualisations as much as we could to represent choices and data?

I have rarely seen information presented in a visually exciting and impactful way in government documents or website.

Why? It can't be due to accessibility - it is simple to display the same information in text or tabular form and to provide alt text.

This is where the web can provide support.

I'm a big fan of infographics and the Information is beautiful and Cool Infographics blogs are two of my favourite sites. They provides some stunning examples of how information can be presented pictorially to convey meaning.

They can be as simple as this comparison of the amount of time US citizens spend each year sitting in front of the idiot box television passively watching, versus the estimated amount of time it took to create all of Wikipedia - over 1 billion english words alone (begging the question, what would happen if we could redirect all that wasted energy).

 

Or as complex as this explanation of the Left vs Right US political world (click to view it larger).

Thanks to the growth of Web 2.0, there are now an array of online services and tools designed to assist you visualise data in creative and useful ways.

These can help agencies revitalise their data, see it in new ways and generate new realisations and understandings.

It is even possible, with open data approaches, to integrate data from other agencies with your own information and present it in visually effective ways, updating it live.

To help you get started, here's a set of online services that can be used to generate interesting visualisations. Most are free.

Online tools

Creately
Particularly useful for flow diagrams, Creately is a highly collaborative and flexible tool, allowing the creation of very professional infographics solo or in a collaborative way. The tool is also useful for project planning and other visually focused activities.

Gapminder
As used by Hans Rosling in brilliant TED talks, GapMinder provides the ability to automate time series to look at data changes over time. You can choose from existing data or add your own to create brilliant mash-ups.

Google Public Data
Google Public Data is more of a simple charting tool that you can use to display your information as bar, line and pie charts, however it also allows you to add bubbles over Google Maps and provide time series data, where you can map one or two variables and manually jump around in time, or hit a play button to watch changes unfold step by step.

Hohli Charts
A simple, yet elegant tool for creating simple charts, scatter plots, radar charts and venn diagrams based on Google's charting tools, Hohli makes it very easy to make distinctive graphs.

Many Eyes
This is a beta service provided by IBM,  but don't let that scare you - the tool works fines. Many Eyes lets you upload your own data or use data in the site to generate a wide range of visualisations including a good range of world maps, word clouds bubble charts, scattergrams and treemaps. There's a good chance you'll find some of your publicly released data already visualised here.

New York Times Viz Lab
This can be used to visualise New York Times data using an embedded version of IBM's ManyEyes technology. You can also look through visualisations created by others. While not a separate service, it should make you consider whether you could integrate a visualisation tool into your own website to allow your own visitors to visualise your data and create their own views.

Statplanet
Visualise the planet using existing data, or create your own charts, scatter plots and world maps by adding your own. StatPlanet's flash-based mapping tool is used by a number of public sector organisations at a global scale to plot development data across the world.

TagCrowd
A functional word mapping tool, TagCrowd isn't as versatile as Wordle (below), however is very good for some uses, such as creating an even block of text, mapping frequency by size - such as for the backdrop of a document cover.

Wordle
If you need word maps, Wordle creates the most elegant and flexible ones on the web. Use it to look at your documents or speeches in a visual form (you might be surprised at which words occur most frequently) and tweak settings such as font, direction and colours. It can also be useful for mapping open answers in survey data to visually represent the top concerns.

Other tools
Here's some web-based visualisation tools that use existing online data to present it in visual ways. They provide inspiration and new approaches for viewing internet information, 16 Awesome Data Visualization Tools and The Best Tools for Vizualisation.

And here's 28 tools you can use to add visualisations to your own website.

Know of any other great visualisation tools? Add then in the comments below.

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