The rise of the internet over the last fifteen years has resulted in remarkable new possibilities for government and citizen engagement. Leaders inside and outside government are using social media tools to realize the principles of participation, collaboration, transparency and efficiency to address the challenges facing our country. This movement, often called Gov 2.0., is explored each year at a two day event I attended called the Gov 2.0 Summit.
Jules Polonetsky, Co-chair and Director of the Future of Privacy Forum, led a session titled “the Future of Privacy” and he shared a particularly interesting point of view on responsible data practices. Throughout the Summit, there was disagreement regarding the use of data; some demanded privacy while others advocated openness and easy distribution. Jules, however, had a more unique perspective: citizens will be more comfortable with their data being shared as long as there is an obvious and relevant purpose that benefits that citizen — what he calls “featurizing data use.”
In a pre-Summit interview, Jules poses a major challenge for government,
“How can we featurize data use so that Americans, and so citizens and anyone who is web searching, doesn’t feel trapped by the government, doesn’t feel analyzed, but feels hey, I’m in charge of what’s going on here. If that is what Gov 2.0 means, Web 2.0 could be the solution and Gov 2.0 could really drive privacy solutions by giving people some insight, some value, some understanding by making data use a valuable feature.”
But what does all this actually mean? Jules presented an example (though not specific to government) that brought this concept to life. Think back to when Facebook’s newsfeed was first released. Days after the feature debuted in 2006, hundreds of thousands of Facebook users created groups protesting the newsfeed because they felt it was displaying their information without permission. However, once users realized there was something in it for them, and it was obvious, they became comfortable with Facebook sharing their data. Now, four years later, users love the newsfeed — after all, how could we not love a tool that makes Facebook-stalking easier?
In order to responsibly share data online, there needs to be a clear and obvious benefit to the user. Do you agree with this standpoint or do you think data should be shared even without a clear user benefit?
On September 27, 2010 from 8:00 am - 10:00 am, Ogilvy will be hosting our very own Gov 2.0 event: How Social Media Tools are Shaping Government, the 2010 Elections and Issue Campaigns. Want to learn more? Read Rachel’s Caggiano’s post. Alternatively (or in addition to), you can visit this link for more information and to RSVP. If you didn’t have the opportunity to go to the Gov 2.0 Summit (hosted by Tim O’Reilly and TechWeb), you can still watch many of the sessions on Tim O’Reilly’s gov 2.0 Summit YouTube video channel. My colleague, Kelly Ferraro, also wrote a (riveting) post on the Summit so be sure to check it out here.
Photo courtesy of Alex Howard @ gov20.govfresh.com
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