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Codebreaker

Obama tells government agencies to go mobile

John Moe May 24, 2012

When he took office, President Obama vowed to make government operations significantly more transparent to the public. While some of those efforts have been more successful than others, the president is now pushing to get government information into a form where people are increasingly accessing the Internet: apps on mobile devices. Yesterday, Mr. Obama told government agencies that they have a year to show significant progress toward building more apps that let the American people know what’s going on. Kind of a cocky ultimatum, when you think about it since there’s no clear Or Else message to go along with it and it assumes that Obama will still be the president this time next year.

From Reuters:

What this means in practical terms is a massive expansion in public access to government data, from healthcare and education to energy and public safety, which the administration hopes will boost jobs by encouraging innovation.
But public interest group Free Press said what was really needed from Obama were communication laws and competition policies that make broadband more accessible to everyone. “Government’s most important role in this space is not as a content creator,” said Free Press policy director Matt Wood.

 

Matt Wood makes the memo for the second day in a row! Congratulations, Matt! See you tomorrow!

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