We talk with John McMillan, the Australian Government’s Information Commissioner, about what the OGP might mean for a nation well-known for its early adoption of Gov 2.0 and other forms of connected government.

Professor McMillan is a long-time advocate of the principles and practices of open government. His model for open government balances freedom of information with privacy protection and the promotion of information policy, and he offers some thoughts about the practical challenges facing Australia and other governments in the pursuit of greater openness, and the opportunities that OGP membership presents for collaboration.

One of the strong themes in information policy reform has been the need for a better framework to enable information sharing within government, between governments, and between government and the community, and that involves a commitment to open data, it involves a commitment to proper privacy and security protection – so governments need to be cooperative and [the OGP] is another platform for them to do that..

About Professor John McMillan

Prof John McMillan AO was appointed Australian Information Commissioner in November 2010 to head a new office responsible for freedom of information, privacy protection and advice to government on information management policy.

John was formerly the Commonwealth Ombudsman from 2003–2010 and the Integrity Commissioner (Acting) for the Australian Commission for Law Enforcement Integrity in 2007. He is an Emeritus Professor of the Australian National University. He is co-author of a leading student text, Control of Government Action.

In the 1970s, John was a founding member of the Freedom of Information Campaign Committee, which led the public campaign for enactment of the Freedom of Information Act 1982 . He is a National Fellow of the Institute of Public Administration Australia, a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Law and former President of the Australian Institute of Administrative Law.

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Episode links and resources

• Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) website and on Facebook
• Open Government Partnership
• OAIC Report: Open public sector information: from principles to practice
• Govhack
• My School website
• US Government’s OGP Action Plan

60-second snapshots

On the role of all tiers of government:

On the economic impetus of open government:

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The Dashboard enables Edmonton-ains (and others) to use  simple visualisations or dig deeper to look at performance measurement data as well as the legislation underpinning them.

I think this has really set a precedent for making performance measures really understandable.

About Ashley Casovan

Ashley is the Strategic Coordinator for the Chief Information Officer at the City of Edmonton. Passionate about creating open government and enhancing community engagement, she is currently working on several innovative projects within the Information Technology Branch, the City of Edmonton and beyond. Prior to working with the City of Edmonton, Ashley was a political organizer in Canada and the United States. Outside work, Ashley is an active board member with Next Gen, Equal Voice Alberta North, and the Institute of Public Administration, Canada’s New Public Servant Committee.

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• City of Edmonton Citizen Dashboard
• Transforming Edmonton strategic plan

60-second snapshots

On gaining organisational support for open data activities:

On lessons learned from the citizen dashboard so far:

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In Europe, the culture is not so much a start-up culture, but more like a co-creation culture with different parts of society – cities, developers, organisations and civil society in general.  And things may look… and maybe are!… a little bit slower as a result of this approach, but it’s a different way.”

About Esteve Almirall

Esteve Almirall serves as Associate Professor in Esade Business Schoool and UPF (Universitat Pompeu Fabra) focusing his research on Innovation and Innovation Management where he has more than 30 publications on the field. His work has been referenced in HBR and he is a frequent speaker in conferences around Innovation, Smart Cities, Living Labs and Open Data/Gov.

His background is a mix of Management Science (PhD) and Computer Science (MSc, MRes). Esteve is also highly involved in European Projects and EU organizations being Council Member of the ENoLL (European Network of Living Labs) and coordinating/participating in some EU projects on Innovation and Smart Cities, such as Open Cities and Commons for Europe.

About Carles Ferreiro

Carles is the CEO of dotopen, a digital enterprise focused on open innovation particularly within cities.

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Episode links and resources

• Commons4EU website
• ESADE
• dotopen

60-second snapshots

On a co-creation approach:

On the entrepreneur as a change agent for civic innovation:

Commons4EU – explaining Code for Europe and BuB for Europe initiatives through their fellows

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As the deadline for submissions approaches for the News Challenge on Open Government, John Bracken, the Knight Foundation’s Director of Media Innovation shares his observations on the journey so far and provides some insights for making project submissions, as well as how everyone can contribute to this timely Challenge to accelerate better ways that government and citizens can interact.

By putting a focus on and valuing the conversation and engagement around the ideas, our hope and expectation is that… even if you aren’t among the winners… even if you’re coming in and sketching out on a cocktail napkin a tool you would hope to see – the spotlight that we can help to put on the community that we’ve brought together around this contest… will leave your idea better off even if it’s not funded.

About John Bracken

John Bracken is director of media innovation for the Knight Foundation. He oversees the Knight News Challenge, Knight’s prototype fund, its journalism and technology investments. Bracken has over 10 years experience as a philanthropic investor in digital media, media policy, innovation and global internet freedom, having previously worked at the Ford Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation.

Bracken is a frequent presenter at media and technology conferences and serves as an adviser to 1871, a co-working resource for digital startups in Chicago.  A 2009 fellow of Leadership Greater Chicago, Bracken has a masters degree from the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania and a BA from Pitzer College in Claremont, California. He writes @jsb, johnbracken.net and at the Knight Foundation blog.

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Episode links and resources

• Knight Foundation News Challenge site and FAQs
• Knight Foundation website
• Challenge Blog posts
  • What you need to know as #newschallenge deadline nears
  • Answers to the 7 most common News Challenge questions

60-second snapshots

On sparking conversations about Open Government:

On how Open Government fits the Knight Foundation’s communication focus:

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Ahead of taking formal applications, an “inspiration phase” has been launched for the 2013 Knight News Challenge. Some $5 million of Knight Foundation funding will be announced in June for innovative projects around Open Government. Amid much talk (and much tech) focused on more open, transparent, connected governments – as well as the emergence of the 58-nation Open Government Partnership – this Challenge program aims to enable projects that in the broadest sense foster better communication in support of the Open Gov movement.

We hear from Chris Sopher, Project Manager for the 2013 Knight News Challenge, about the Challenge goals and how the inspiration phase will help potential participants to shape their submission ideas through a new online space developed with OpenIDEO.

What are the ideas in Open Government that can help build the field, can help explore new ideas, new approaches to trying to engage people in Government or inform them about what’s happening in their community in a new way?

The Knight News Challenge is international and open to submissions from governments and public sector agencies as well as civic innovators, private sector and non-profit organisations. If you’re considering a pitch, don’t miss this episode!

About Chris Sopher

Chris Sopher is project manager on Knight Foundation’s Journalism and Media Innovation team. He has written and spoken around the world about young people’s engagement with news and civic life through his project Younger Thinking.

Prior to Knight, Chris researched digital media and public policy at the Emerging Media Research Council and helped found the national college mentoring nonprofit Strive for College. He earned a bachelor’s in public policy analysis from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and is a Morehead-Cain and Truman Scholar.

Feature image courtesy Joichi Ito

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Episode links and resources

• Knight Foundation News Challenge site and FAQs
• Knight Foundation website
• Blog post about why Knight is doing the Open Government challenge
• Blog post: An opportunity for massive reinvention
• News Challenge winners from each of the three rounds in 2012: Networks, Data, Mobile

60-second snapshots

On framing Open Government:

On what the Knight Foundation is hoping to achieve from the Challenge:

On making public information useful as a key focus area:

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Nigel Shadbolt discusses the realities of harnessing the potential of open data for governments, businesses and citizens. With Sir Tim Berners-Lee, Professor Shadbolt is the joint head of the newly formed Open Data Institute in London which he summarises as “… building the supply side; building capability and empowerment; developing a demand side”.

Calling for “a real forensic commitment to open data”, he explores new economic models needed around open data as well as the need to better understand where and knowing how the value is being generated.

There’s a feeling that the job is never done – it’s eternally vigilant process of trying to improve the quality, improve the format, improve the ease of publication.

Professor Shadbolt also shares his hopes and aspirations for the Open Government Partnership in the next 12 months.

About Prof. Nigel Shadbolt

Nigel Shadbolt is Professor of Artificial Intelligence and Head of the Web and Internet Science Group, Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton.  With over 400 publications he has researched on topics ranging from cognitive psychology to computational neuroscience, Artificial Intelligence to the Semantic Web. He was one of the originators of the interdisciplinary field of Web Science and is a Director of the Web Science Trust, and of the Web Foundation – both organisations have a common commitment to advance our understanding of the Web and promote the Web’s positive impact on society.

In 2009 the Prime Minister appointed him and Sir Tim Berners-Lee as Information Advisors to transform access to Public Sector Information. This work led to the highly acclaimed data.gov.uk site that now provides a portal to over 9000 datasets. In May 2010 he was asked by the UK Coalition Government to join the Public Sector Transparency Board – this oversees Open Data releases across the public sector. In April 2011 he became Chair of the UK Government’s midata programme – which seeks to empower consumers by releasing their data back to them. He is Chairman and Co-founder of the Open Data Institute, based in Shoreditch, London.

He was also a founder and Chief Technology Officer of ID protection company Garlik Ltd. In 2008 Garlik was awarded Technology Pioneer status by the Davos World Economic Forum and won the prestigious UK national BT Flagship IT Award. In December 2011 Garlik was acquired by Experian Ltd.

Prof Shadbolt is also an international speaker at the  ICEGOV 2012 conference – to see more about the conference, visit here.

Feature images courtesy josema and RSLN

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Episode links and resources

• About Prof Nigel Shadbolt
• About the UK Open Data Institute
• Data.gov.uk
• UK Open Data Innovation Community
• UK Public Data Principles
• 5 stars of open data
• Legislation.gov.uk
• Wired magazine article: “Professor Nigel Shadbolt outlines plans for Open Data Institute” – 22 May 2012
• The Guardian article: “Government data PDF enthusiasts will be ‘dealt with’, says Maude” – 17 Oct 2012
• A Right to Data – interview with Chris Yiu of Policy Exchange

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  @UKODI CEO: @agentGav CTO: @JeniT
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Theresa Pardo is well known for her work leading the Center for Technology in Government (CTG). This discussion looks at public value and taking a portfolio approach to open government, as articulated through the CTG’s Public Value Assessment Tool.

In this interview, Theresa explores several dimensions of what it means for governments to authentically deliver public value. Her position that “engagement is not either/or… we need a more nuanced understanding of what we mean by engagement” makes great sense when we think about harnessing diverse perspectives and disciplines to better understand the value that open government can add. The Public Value Assessment Tool asks the questions that practitioners can use to create value-based portfolios of open government initiatives.

We think not so much in terms of measures… but helping government management and government leadership think about value in a way that is more broadly based than the bottom-line return-on-investment models… in government, we need to think beyond the bottom-line.

Theresa also discusses her belief that the next generation of open data will be more about creating community-oriented data resources – creating and presenting data in ways that are of use to specific communities.

The Center for Technology in Government at the University of Albany at the State University of New York are hosts of the 2012 ICEGOV international conference.

About Theresa Pardo

Theresa Pardo is the Director of the Center for Technology in Government, University at Albany at the State University of New York.

Theresa’s current portfolio includes the development of a public value assessment framework for U.S. federal government open government initiatives funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF), and the development of models of social and technical interactions in cross-boundary information sharing and integration as well as information technology enterprise governance. In addition to funding from NSF, Theresa’s research at CTG has been funded by the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada, U.S. Department of Justice, the U.S. Library of Congress, the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, the United Nations and New York State and local government agencies, among others.

Theresa is a Research Associate Professor at the Rockefeller College of Public Administration and Policy and an affiliated faculty member of the College of Computing and Information at the University at Albany. She is one of the founding developers of the highly ranked Government Information Strategy and Management curriculum at Rockefeller College. The academic program focuses on the policy, management and technology dimensions of information and technology use in the design and delivery of government programs. In 2008, Theresa received the University at Albany’s Excellence in Teaching Award.

Theresa is also the co-chair of the ICEGOV 2012 conference – hear her sneak preview (5 mins) of the conference here.

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Episode links and resources

• Center for Technology in Government (CTG)
• CTG projects
  • A Public Value Analysis Tool for Open Government Planning
  • Opening Government: Modeling the Informational Relationships between Government and Society
  • Moldova – social media and open government
• Philly Rising Collaborative

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• Tags: #opengov #icegov