Just 4 Days Left to Join the National Dialogue on Government IT Solutions

stuartmckee — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 12:45:00 GMT

This is the week to participate in shaping how Recovery.gov is built and operated. As I mentioned on Monday, the Government is hosting a National Dialogue and wants to hear your ideas. You can submit ideas, vote on ideas you agree with or comment at TheNationalDialogue.org.

As a part of the 2009 Tech Policy Agenda, Voices for Innovation members told this Administration that “technology- and vendor-neutral procurement policies” are a priority. Make sure the Administration knows that Technology Neutrality is a priority by joining the National Dialogue.

Here are just three of many ideas and posts around tech neutrality submitted to the National Dialogue about Technology Neutrality (please note you need to be logged in to comment and vote*):

Technology Neutrality
by mwendy
Any technology chosen by the Administration to help Recovery.gov should be accomplished in a technologically neutral way - that is, no one type of IT business model / development model should be chosen by virtue of the model alone. It guarantees little.
Read More | Comment | Vote
Open Data Will Enable Democratized Analysis and Accountability
by jzuck
Focus on making the data available rather than the analysis.
Third parties will make the most interesting use of the data. If a site like Recovery.org focuses on providing Open Data (timely, raw, and technologically neutral), it will leverage the passion and creativity of the populace to ensure real transparency and accountability.
Read More | Comment | Vote
Don't buy more solutions...use what you already own!
by YouAlreadyOwnItGuy
Instead of going out and spending more money on a solution or capability, the government should look at what it has already invested in and use it to do collection of data, storage, deliver analytics with a geospatial component (so people can search from a map of their area) and communicate it out to the public.
Read More | Comment | Vote

Also, I would be very interested in any ideas you have submitted. Please use the comments section below to share them with VFI so that we can help support your ideas.

Don’t miss out on this opportunity to share your ideas with the Government. I hope you will join me and be a part of this conversation.

*If you haven’t registered to join the National Dialogue, click here - it takes less than a minute.

Interoperability, Innovation, and Economic Stimulus, Revisited

sselby — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 15:17:00 GMT

A friend sent me an opinion piece that appeared in the Financial Times a few weeks ago. It’s one of those stories that had me saying “yes, that’s right” when I first read it. But as I thought about it and tested it against a few examples, I found myself saying, “well, sort of -- what about this situation or that one?” And then it led me to the stimulus package.

The article, by Michael Schrage, states that “prospects for innovation in the real economy have never been more robust.” That’s good news for all of us in the innovation business, especially those of us in VFI. The reason: “Innovations once crafted to stand alone are increasingly built to work together, or ‘interoperate.’” He believes that interoperability is increasingly determining economic value not just in the IT world but across the business landscape. Schrage offers examples of where interoperability as a core principle of innovation is producing positive economic and other benefits in fields such as power grids, medical devices, and nanotechnology.

It’s an interesting thought and it does align with some well known trends. One is the increasing reliance on collaboration in R&D to reduce costs and speed new products to market; collaboration capitalizes on the ability of intellectual property to bring partners and competitors together through cross licensing. That is clearly happening in the world of IT interoperability where cross licensing has transformed competitors into partners. The collaboration between Novell and Microsoft speaks to this.

The relation between interoperability and innovation has not received all that much scrutiny. I know of one other study (actually a series of studies), from Urs Gasser and John Palfrey of The Berkman Center at Harvard Law School. Breaking Down Digital Barriers: When and How ICT Interoperability Drives Innovation is an in-depth analysis of three case studies, with the findings presented in a summary white paper. Like Schrage, Gasser and Palfrey believe there is a link between increased interoperability and greater innovation: “One of the reasons why we tend to like interoperability is that we believe it leads to innovation, as well as other positive things like consumer choice, ease of use, and competition.”

At the same time, Gasser and Palfrey have their eyes wide open and issue clear words of caution: “Interoperability does not mean the same thing in every context. Interoperability is not always good for everyone all the time. And the relationship between interoperability and innovation, while it likely exists in most cases, is extremely hard to prove.”

It may be hard to prove because it is not a one-for-one relationship. There need to be other ingredients present. The one that comes most immediately to mind is choice. Gasser and Palfrey acknowledge that choice helps to generate the competition at the heart of much innovation. Choice fosters competition, creates economic opportunity, and spurs innovation.

Choice does not enter into the picture painted by Schrage, at least in the short opinion piece where it is not mentioned. Yet governments are very much aware of it and why it matters – good news for those of us who have governments as customers! A number of governments in Latin America have made choice a guiding principle of their IT procurement policies. In the current issue of “Americas Quarterly: The Policy Journal for our Hemisphere,” pages 103-106, Chris Katopis and Gilberto Gilan examine five countries that have enacted policies supporting technological neutrality in government IT procurement. (Tech neutrality is treating all technology vendors equally by basing procurement decisions on objective and neutral criteria – a level playing field, in other words.) Governments at the local, state or national level in these countries (Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Peru, and Costa Rica) realize that choice is the most efficient method to obtain the best value for the IT dollar as well as the most effective way to stimulate the local IT industry.

For those of us in the States, we need to help our government keep the power of choice uppermost in mind as they spend the stimulus package. Wise choices based on tech neutrality and a level playing field can help us achieve significant outcomes. Take a moment to send an email to Congress and your state legislators letting them know where you stand on choice.

Until next time.

SFS

The Voice of Innovation : Stimulus, choice

Just 4 Days Left to Join the National Dialogue on Government IT Solutions

Interoperability, Innovation, and Economic Stimulus, Revisited