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I bet we look back on May 21, 2009 as an historic day; a day when everything changed…On this day, the Obama Administration, specifically its CIO, Vivek Kundra, announced the launch of Data.gov which “will open up the workings of government by making economic, healthcare, environmental, and other government information available on a single website, allowing the public to access raw data and transform it in innovative ways.”
Obviously, the mere thought of a government opening up its proverbial kimono is amazing enough, the real, grand moment, however, will be when the first applications of this data materialize. Just as Apple’s AppStore for the iPhone displays the brilliance (and not a little stupidity) of the crowd, Data.gov will bring forth today’s innovative developers and enterprises. I can’t wait to see what they do!
One day earlier, Google announced it will open up its servers to geographic data from anyone. This goes beyond its 2005 open API announcement for its map services enabling mashups to “viewing, storing and updating geodata on the web.” And even with some initial service limitations, this is a win-win for all developers — as they no longer have to manage their own geo-data store — as well as Google itself, who can add this new geo-data to their search results and possibly generate revenue from it.
One week earlier, the Wolfram|Alpha had its soft launch “to make all systematic knowledge immediately computable and accessible to everyone.” This is a “quest to make knowledge computable.” It also “contains 10+ trillion of pieces of data, 50,000+ types of algorithms and models, and linguistic capabilities for 1000+ domains.” It is truly amazing to have come so far and daunting to still have so far to go in its endeavors.
What these events all have in common is the super consolidation and subsequent dissemination of the world’s data in the hope of it becoming knowledge and wisdom. The results could be life-altering, good or bad, but definitely different.
What I hope to also see from these events in my clients and other enterprises is their wake-up from the deep sleep so many of them are in when it comes to dealing with corporate data. If the above events are the future trend, huge changes need to begin in corporations.
Most of them are so caught up with securing a perimeter that no longer exists, complying with useless but required SOX audits, and working around Legal’s latest inane guidelines, they see all “their data” as confidential and therefore secret. This often occurs within the silos of the corporation itself, so sharing of data doesn’t even cross lines of business or departments. It is my hypothesis, as seen in a few leading edge organizations, that there is only a very small percentage (~10%) of all corporate data which is truly confidential or proprietary, and enterprises are losing out on significant opportunities to increase sales, innovate new products/services, or improve operations by not widely disseminating the other 90%.
So, how do we get them to see it? How do they “consolidate and disseminate” in a way which is secure and appropriate, yet leverages and empowers the employees, partners, vendors, suppliers, stakeholders, peers, and others connected to these companies? How should companies democratize data?
Though President Obama has yet to announce a CTO, he has announced his choice for Federal CIO, Vivek Kundra. His choice is a promising one, given Kundra’s fantastic success as CTO for Washington D.C. For example, he saved the city millions by switching off Microsoft’s Office platform and onto Google’s Apps platform for desktop productivity and even crowdsourced technology solutions for the city, saving even more millions in development fees.
O’Reilly has a great summation of audio and video clips describing what Kundra has to say. Viewing them has given me great hope for the US and our amazing leader who can recognize innovative talent in this traditionally unfathomable space.
Could it be? Could we be getting a U.S. Chief Technology Officer? It certainly seems possible, with our most technologically savvy President in office. If we were to have such a role, it would most definitely enable Obama to intelligently craft many of the solutions to the issues he has been talking about, such as healthcare, climate change, energy independence, government 2.0, etc.
Technology Review has a good interview with one of the names being bandied about for holding such a post, Cisco’s Padmasree Warrior.
Barack Obama’s Inaugural Address - January 20, 2009
As transcribed and posted in The New York Times
Watch the Address on CNN.com
And keep abreast of our new America here
Reading Calacanis’ popular and excellent post on “The Future of Startups,” and more and more announcements like the one Zappos’ CEO, Tony Hsieh, gave to his employees last week, has given me the feeling we still have not yet seen the bottom of this particular barrel. Thus, I do not envy President-elect Obama. Though I doubt it is ever easy to lead a large organization or country, to lead the U.S. right now is most likely the hardest job on the planet given the death spiral we are in.
There are so many important issues to address, how does one choose and make sure one’s actions are successful. Looking at the list of “agenda” items on Change.gov, it is a daunting task. My guess would be the economy and the war are top of everyone’s list given their far reaching causes and effects. (As a sidenote, I see here, that someone is finally making some sense on the proposed automakers’ bailout.)
Two issues close to my heart and, in my opinion, the most important to our future success as a viable country, are the Environment and Technology.
During this week’s Governor’s Global Climate Summit, Obama sent along an inspiring vidcast of his objectives for this agenda item, the highlights of which include:
- Federal cap and trade system
- Target 1990 emissions levels by 2020, 80% reduction by 2050
- $15b/year investment
- Create 5 million green jobs
Given the response at the conference, these kinds of far-reaching, specific targets are just what we need to make a difference. His environmental team is also saying the right things, especially by seeing the need to work across traditional government silo’s in order for programs to work.
As for technology, Obama will be the first U.S. president to understand the power of “being digital,” and how it can return power to the people and trust in government. It is my sincere hope that rather than giving up his Blackberry, he instead pulls our government into the 21st century by making the necessary changes to antiquated rules and regulations, appointing a cabinet-level CTO and driving an appropriately open technology platform upon which we are all able to make our voices heard and be effective in fixing all that is broken together. The BBC has a nice summary of the issues and great comments from some of the visionaries in the field, like O’Reilly and Battelle.
In order to rise from the ashes, we must make significant progress on these fronts. They are the source of new jobs, new ideas and a sustainable way for us to exist. The question is how…
