Archive: Category: TechPresident

Slate's John Dickerson is reporting that "In an effort to educate the public on the state of the economy and his plans for improving it, President Obama is considering a series of short televised addresses similar to Franklin Roosevelt's fireside chats." According to Dickerson, "Press Secretary Robert Gibbs has told the television networks that the administration may request more time than usual for a president. Gibbs did not provide a schedule but described the addresses as lasting about 10 minutes each." How 20th century of the President. Now, I understand why Obama still needs television to get his message out, especially to low-information voters. But after demonstrating the 2008 campaign that he understood the power of abundance online, posting thousands of...

If you follow me on Twitter, you probably noticed that I spent my lunch hour at the Open Society Institute today for a talk on "The Future of News" by Paul Steiger, the longtime managing editor of the Wall Street Journal, who is the head of ProPublica, an "independent, non-profit newsroom that produces investigative journalism in the public interest." It was a mostly gloomy session, framed by the news that 11,000 professional journalists have lost their jobs in the last two years, and all the bad news currently coming out of the newspaper industry. You also probably know, if you follow me on Twitter, that I was gnashing my teeth for much of the time, frustrated by several questions from audience...

Obama hits the send button. Will 13 million hit reply? Did Vivek Kundra's transparent policies as DC CTO help suss out the office crook? Both TechDailyDose and David Stephenson think so. Obama new media hunk Chris Murphy stays close to home base, joins GMMB. Patrick Ruffini does his oppo-research, live-blogging Nate Silver's SXSW keynote and a Markos Moulitsas session on marketing. Obligatory mention of Twitter: who to follow in the Twitter #politics arena....

Don't miss Clay Shirky and Steven Johnson's latest ruminations on the future of journalism and the fate of newspapers; they will clear your head (if it isn't already) about how technology is driving change in this vital arena. Here's a snippet from Shirky: When someone demands to know how we are going to replace newspapers, they are really demanding to be told that we are not living through a revolution. They are demanding to be told that old systems won’t break before new systems are in place. They are demanding to be told that ancient social bargains aren’t in peril, that core institutions will be spared, that new methods of spreading information will improve previous practice rather than upending it. They...

In December 2007, the then-Chief Technology Officer of Washington, DC, Vivek Kundra, testified before a committee of the city council on "Theft and Fraud Prevention in District Government Agencies." He focused on steps his office had taken to create "a culture of accountability and innovation." Kundra, as readers of this blog know, is currently on leave from his new post as federal Chief Information Officer, after an FBI investigation resulted in the arrest last Thursday of a mid-level staffer from the DC Office of the CTO (OCTO) on corruption charges. Kundra is, according to all reports, not implicated in the case, and the FBI affidavit outlining the government's evidence makes no mention of him. A spokesman for DC Mayor Adrian Fenty...

Here's my and Andrew Rasiej's latest Politics 2.0 column, which ran in the Politico last Thursday. If Facebook were a country, it would be the world’s seventh biggest in terms of population. In terms of the amount of attention it draws daily from its 175 million members — roughly 20 to 30 minutes on average spent updating their profiles, reading about their friends, playing games and sharing news — Facebook could easily power a midsize economy. Here in the United States, we already know that Facebook is a meaningful platform for political engagement: from President Barack Obama on down, thousands of politicians, candidates and causes have built presences on the site, accumulating millions of supporters. Given all the social and political activity on...

While you can make a good living poking fun at the Texas legislature (just ask the late, great Molly Ivins), apparently the great state of Texas can claim one serious distinction: According to a new survey of state government information online, released for the start of Sunshine Week, Texas is the only state to provide information in twenty key categories. Most states do provide online information on high-profile topics like campaign financing and school test scores. But only nine provide schools' building inspections and/or safety ratings, and only 13 share school bus inspection reports. And the patchwork of disclosure practices is full of contradictions and absurdities: --"Anyone seeking financial disclosure reports from state officials in Connecticut must e-mail their requests, which...

With some help from our friends at the indispensable TubeMogul, we've got three new YouTube charts up for your data-tracking pleasure. The first shows daily views of Barack Obama's YouTube channel, which continues to be used by Organizing for America. Looks like there's still a sizable following out, judging by a daily viewership of between 60,000 and 120,000, roughly. The other two charts are aggregating the total views, by party, for Senators and Representatives using YouTube's new official channels, Househub and Senatehub. We got a list of the approximately 200 Members of Congress with YouTube channels (see below) and TubeMogul did the rest. It's interesting to note that Republicans are cumulatively beating the Democrats, in both chambers. We haven't normalized this...

I've been multitasking this morning, catching up on email and glancing at Twitter, and three times I've noticed the power of the live, interactive web as a new factor in my life. First, I noticed that a conference at Columbia University that I'm planning to attend tomorrow, on "The Future of Watchdog Journalism," was streaming its session live onto the web via BlogTalkRadio. I had thought I was going to attend this morning too but woke up still fighting a cold that I've had since the weekend. Discovering that I could listen in live, or play back a session that I missed, made it possible for me to stay home and get other things done while catching James Risen, for...

We first met the founders of Howcast.com at the State Department's Alliance of Youth Movements Summit. They were there to film some "how-to" guides for people interested in using social media to foster movements for human rights. Since then I've been peeking in from time to time on their work and getting increasingly more impressed with how they're navigating the new world of online video information sourcing. While a lot of the content on the site is generated by and for users (who earn reputation points by how others rate the quality of their offerings), Howcast is modeling a viderate style that is well worth studying. Advocacy groups of all stripes should take a look. For example, take a look at...