ict – Dave Briggs

LINK: “Outsourcing: The Socitm view”

July 12, 2018

Today, the picture is very different. Socitm policy advocates ‘smart sourcing’ as critical for successful ICT delivery – more aligned with common sense than past Whitehall policies. This is particularly important today, with cloud models offering more flexibility in scale and cost than traditional ICT outsourcing.

Original: https://blog.socitm.net/2018/07/06/outsourcing-the-socitm-view/

What I’ve been reading

April 12, 2012

I find this stuff so that you don’t have to.

Are open standards a closed barrier? | Government Digital Service – "Fresh out of a roundtable discussion on the Open Standards: Open Opportunities consultation, Linda Humphries discusses whether open can really mean closed."
eParticipation needs to be carefully integrated into the complex world of existing participation processes | British Politics and Policy at LSE – "While technical problems can sink eParticipation initiatives, the core challenges are on the social side. Ella Taylor-Smith discusses what eParticipation actually means and how it should be evaluated."
#Unacceptable IT is pervasive | | G-CloudG-Cloud – "Real progress has been blocked by many things including an absence of capability in both departments and their suppliers, by a strong resistance to change, by the perverse incentives of contracts that mean its cheaper to pay service credits than to fix the problem and by an unwillingness to embrace the potential of newer and smaller players to offer status quo-busting ideas."
Canada’s Action Plan on Open Government 1 / 5 – "Canada's commitment to open government is part of the federal government's efforts to foster greater openness and accountability, to provide Canadians with more opportunities to learn about and participate in government, to drive innovation and economic opportunities for all Canadians and, at the same time, create a more cost effective, efficient and responsive government."
GDS design principles – Interesting and important stuff for webbies to consider.
Making the case for a FOSS CMS | Digital by Default – Matt Jukes shares his thinking on choosing a CMS.

You can find all my bookmarks on Pinboard.

What I’ve been reading

April 2, 2012

I find this stuff so that you don’t have to.

Exploring how digital technology can support young people to engage socially and economically in their communities : Tim’s Blog – Tim is "launching an open research project to find key messages for youth-focussed digital innovation"
A manifesto for teaching computer science in the 21st century – John Naughton tells Michael Gove what's needed.
Knowledge Hub architects defend switchover as lever is thrown. – "The architects of the new local government Knowledge Hub, an online platform for exchange of ideas between council officers, politicians and the public, have defended the switchover from its predecessor Communities of Practice (CoPs) after criticism from some users."
Bring your own device to be piloted at Cambridgeshire council – "Four week trial will initially be restricted to Android and Apple operating systems"
The Emerging Government App Store: IT Public Procurement Nirvana? – "Over the last couple of weeks I have had numerous conversations with government executives and IT leaders about cloud computing, open source, shared services, software reuse. These are all different perspectives on IT sourcing, and they are often made problematic by clumsy public procurement procedures."

You can find all my bookmarks on Pinboard.

“Kids today need a licence to tinker”

August 29, 2011

Nice article by John Naughton on the state of IT education in schools:

What is happening is that the national curriculum’s worthy aspirations to educate pupils about ICT are transmuted at the chalkface into teaching kids to use Microsoft software. Our children are mostly getting ICT training rather than ICT education.

And if you can’t see the difference, try this simple thought-experiment: replace “ICT” with “sex” and see which you’d prefer in that context: education or training?

How we got to this ridiculous state of affairs is a long story. It’s partly about how education departments, like generals, are always preparing for the last war. Thus, while we’re moving into a post-PC age, our ICT curriculum is firmly rooted in the desktop computer running Microsoft Windows. It’s also partly about the technophobia of teachers, local councillors and officials. But it’s mainly about the chronic mismatch between the glacial pace of curriculum change in a print-based culture, and the rate of change in the technology.

Bookmarks for February 23rd through April 4th

April 5, 2011

I find this stuff so that you don’t have to.

Reaping the benefits of shared services – Interesting interview with @terryhuggins on the shared services arrangement between South Holland and East Lindsay councils.
UK IT Strategy Sets the Pace for All European Governments, But Can They Deliver? – Interesting coverage of the new UK gov IT strategy
NESTA – Innovation in Public Sector Organisations – "A pilot survey for measuring innovation across the public sector" – interesting read
Loosemore leads Lane Fox vision work | Puffbox.com – Nice update from Simon on some interesting developments.
Things about Blogging – Great blogging tips
COI is dead, long live the GCC? – Good coverage of the future of COI from Andrew.
Seldom a love story: IT and end users – O’Reilly Radar – "Prioritization must be determined by the business, not an IT staffer who's just trying to do the right thing."
Fear of Facebook: Thoughts On The Meaning of Social – "Things aren’t getting any better in terms of privacy related fears."
The zero cost CMS | Stephen Hale – "The digital communications teams I’ve worked in have all spent too much of their time finding ways around the CMS, and not enough time actually communicating."
Citizen journalist or citizen? – Good stuff on bloggers reporting on councils by @podnosh

You can find all my bookmarks on Delicious. There is also even more stuff on my shared Google Reader page.

You can also see all the videos I think are worth watching at my video scrapbook.

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