First POST: Cowed
BY Micah L. Sifry | Monday, March 23 2015
TedCruz.com for president; Meerkat fever; who does Facebook work for (probably not you); Medium, "the billionaire's typewriter"; and much, much more. Read More
Scoring for Livability: How Place I Live Wants to Empower Homebuyers and Renters
BY Jessica McKenzie | Wednesday, February 25 2015
Nobody ever says “I want to live somewhere with lots of pollution, crime and a high unemployment rate.” That, at least, is the assumption behind Place I Live, a website that aggregates, parses and creates visualizations with open data so potential homebuyers and renters can better understand different neighborhoods. Place I Live relaunched on Open Data Day, February 21, with new data and improved functionality.
Read MoreNotes From a Weekend of Cross-Country Civic Hacking
BY Jessica McKenzie | Tuesday, February 24 2015
Code for America's fourth annual CodeAcross civic hacking event took place this past weekend, February 20 – 22, bringing together civically-minded technologists, designers, activists, organizers, and city government in roughly 60 communities around the world. The organizing theme for all events was “Principles for 21st Century Government,” although events varied in terms of duration and content. From Civic Hall in New York City to the National Science Foundation in Arlington, Virginia, to the University of Washington in Seattle, people gathered for data jams, hackathons, unconferences and collaboration.
Read MoreWhat Tech Can and Can't Do to Eradicate Ebola
BY Rebecca Chao | Monday, October 20 2014
Over the weekend, a group of technologists met in New York City to discuss the limits and potential uses of data in combatting the spread of Ebola in West Africa. Read More
In Detroit Water Project, Tech-Driven Philanthropy Takes Off Without Touching Down
BY Denise Cheng | Friday, September 19 2014
Disaster images like this one of Michigan Central Station has led to outpourings of offers to "fix" Detroit (Thomas Hawk/flickr)
Denise Cheng, an independent researcher affiliated with MIT's MIT Center for Civic Media, was surprised to learn that new philanthropy organizations like the Direct Water Project operate remotely. She explores the ins and outs of a new breed of tech-driven, direct philanthropy. Read More
A Competition to Make the City More Resilient
BY Susan Crawford | Tuesday, September 2 2014
When Hurricane Sandy hit New York nearly two years ago, it left devastation in its wake. Homes and livelihoods were lost, and the storm caused $19 billion in estimated damage. Small businesses were particularly hard hit. ... Read More
Amnesty International Releases Panic Button, An App For Human Rights Activists
BY Jessica McKenzie | Monday, June 23 2014
On June 23 Amnesty International released their secret alert system for activists, an Android app called Panic Button. Panic Button (Beta), which techPresident covered at an earlier stage last year, is now available for download in the Google Play Store.
Read MoreHow ISIS Wins At Twitter
BY Jessica McKenzie | Tuesday, June 17 2014
These days everyone, even (or especially) vicious terrorists groups, is all about social media optimization.
Read MoreMOOCs Gain Popularity in China in Spite of Barriers to Access and Anxiety About Western Influence
BY Jessica McKenzie | Tuesday, May 6 2014
Coursera's founder Andrew Ng has announced that China is the education platform's fastest growing market after the United States. More Chinese users download the Android app than in any other country, and China ranks second in number of iOS downloads.
Read MoreNew Report: User Engagement Strategies for Open Data
BY Susannah Vila | Wednesday, March 26 2014
"If you're interested in the way that power works, then data is at the heart of it" says Jon Dovey, a researcher in the UK who is involved in the Open Data Institute's second annual Data as Culture exhibition. The show, which our Jessica McKenzie reported on yesterday, uses art and culture to engage people with open data. It hits on a pressing set of challenges: as more and and more data, both small and big, becomes available, what kind of social impact can we expect it to help generate? If you, as a citizen, can now know much more about public expenditures, does that mean you'll find a way influence those expenditures so that they more accurately reflect the interests of you or your neighbors? Not necessarily. That's why efforts like the ODI's are useful. It's also the theme of a new report that we're publishing today: "User Engagement Strategies for Open Data." The report explores 5 cases from 3 continents with an eye towards defining what works for engaging target groups of people with data about the activities of government and development institutions. Our goal is for these strategies to be informative for technologists, activists and entrepreneurs who are creating products with open data that they wish to see used. You can download the report here. Let us know if you think it's useful.
User Engagement Strategies for Open Data
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