My friend Dr. Mark Drapeau has got a really cool article in Mashable, “Government 2.0: Crowdsourced Beltway Pandits“, about how Web 2.0 in government isn’t just helping government work together or broadcast to their constituents. It’s helping the constituents more actively participate and take a role in government. It’s make it a 2 way street.
Here’s a snippet:
In his Gettysburg Address, President Lincoln mentioned that government is “of the people, by the people, [and] for the people,” but interestingly among all the feedback I have received, no one has pointed out that all of my writing on Government 2.0 has been about what the government itself is doing. What’s your role as a citizen?
One of the cool parts of the Flickr project that I helped start at the Library of Congress was how it wasn’t just about creating a new way for the community to enjoy photos. It was just as much about finding a way for the community to participate the process. They could tag, comment on, and annotate photos. Plenty of the data that was being contributed, once verified, was getting taken back and integrated into the Library record.
So… yes, I agree with Mark. I think more and more you’re going to see citizens be able to play more an active participatory role in how they’re governed through the use of Web 2.0
Oatmeal Stout - Justin Thorp's blog 