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LINK: “Can government stop losing its mind?”
Can government remember? Is it condemned to repeat mistakes? Or does it remember too much and so see too many reasons why anything new is bound to fail? Original:
Dave Briggs
An online notebook
Dave Briggs
An online notebook
Dave
LINK: “The wellsprings of UK digital reform part 1 – the backstory”
While there are some great pockets of work taking place to deliver better public services, the UK government’s overall attempts at technology-enabled, or “e-government” or “digital”, reform appear to be struggling to achieve and sustain the benefits promised at the…
Implementing digital civic infrastructure
I’ve banged on about this before, but then that’s because I think it is pretty important. To quickly recap – digital civic infrastructure is an idea I have been thinking about for some time as a means through which local…
LINK: “Service patterns could be big! (actually .. small)”
There’s a knotty systemic and cost problem with local authorities and other public service organisations delivering essentially the same core services in different parts of the country. We all recognise that we are often doing the same thing, but we…
LINK: “From USENET to Facebook: The second time as farce”
Facebook repeats the pattern of USENET, this time as farce. As a no-holds-barred Wild West sort of social network, USENET was filled with everything we rightly complain about today. Original:
LINK: “Blogging is most certainly not dead”
Social media is as compelling as ever, but people are increasingly souring on the surveillance state Skinner boxes like Facebook and Twitter. Decentralized media like blogs and newsletters are looking better and better these days… Original:
LINK: “OLPC’s $100 laptop was going to change the world — then it all went wrong”
By the time OLPC officially launched in 2007, the “green machine” — once a breakout star of the 21st-century educational technology scene — was a symbol of tech industry hubris, a one-size-fits-all American solution to complex global problems. But more…
Six themes for a good local government digital strategy
I recently went through the rather painful process of applying for a senior digital transformation role in local government and not getting it. I might write in more detail at some point about it all, but right now I am…
LINK: “Broken words and why they matter”
Digital – as a word – is broken. We have slapped it onto the front of two many old world applications in an attempt to normalise and ‘make safe’ new concepts that at this point saying something is digital is…
LINK: “#LocalDigitalSkills – making digital inclusion happen, together”
… we want there to be Local Digital Skills Partnerships all over the country. Original:
LINK: “Kick-off for the essex.gov.uk project”
To help us understand the ‘as is’ in more detail we’ve gathered insights from available data and call centre staff, tested how easy it is for users to find things on the site and identified some key gaps in understanding…
LINK: “10 steps for digital success [from] Hertfordshire County Council”
You want people to use your digital service. You want best value for money when you buy or build new digital services. Here are 10 steps to success. Original:
Bitcoin and blockchain explained
Nice, funny video that might just help a few folk understand this stuff:
Be your own best customer to advance your transformation
One thing that has been taking up quite a bit of my attention lately is how, in the real world, an organisation can do the kind or big picture, strategic transformation that’s almost certainly needed whilst making progress on what…
Simple, free collaboration using internet tools
Since joining the steering group for LocalGov Digital, I’ve been getting back into the swing of things when it comes to working remotely with people spread across the country. In 2018 it feels like an obvious point to make, but…
Share your stuff with LocalGov Digital!
I’m well chuffed to have joined the steering group for LocalGov Digital, the informal network of bods doing interesting stuff with computers, the internet and change within local councils. I’m leading on communication and am kicking off a few pieces…
[RL] The problem with local government software
Original post from Gavin Beckett With a very small number of exceptions, the established local government technology market is populated by companies that fundamentally do not understand user research. They do not start with user needs or design great user…
[RL] Accounts and portals
Original post from Salman Chaudhri, FutureGov …a different, more nuanced approach to authentication can save councils money in the long run. By focusing on making the transactions that apply to most people as seamless as possible, it can help to…
[RL] Starting the ‘Reading List’
Finding time to blog is tough, and while I enjoy putting together the Five for Friday posts, you may have noticed that even doing those is tricky. To get myself back into the habit of regularly posting, I’m going to…
Two blockers to radical (digital) change
I was asked this morning for the two main blockers to progress in the various attempts at technology enabled change over the years, whether titled e-government or digital transformation. Here’s what I came up with – it would be interesting…