The 10,000 Solutions page is a really interesting way for people to collaborate and brainstorm new, helpful ideas.
I posted an idea for creating an app that will allow people to upload photos that would appear on other people's Google Maps. I think this could be used in multiple ways. For a public information purpose, it could help people see what is going on currently in a different location, for example if there are protests or even riots in a certain area, others could see photos with exact locations listed. People currently post photos to Twitter, but they don't have location data unless the poster lists it specifically.
It could also be used recreationally, to follow what your friends on Google Latitude are doing or eating or seeing. Since more and more smart phones have decent cameras and there are many applications for editing and enhancing them, more people are taking photos with their phones and so why not share them?
My favorite solutions posted so far are:
Failure For a Change, which would allow art students to try selling their artwork as a way to learn about creating an entrepreneurial venture. I love this because it encourages a practical view on making a career out of a passion. Unfortunately, failure is the most effective method to lead to growth and new knowledge, so the more you can get out of the way while still in school the better.
Solar Art is a great idea. First, more art on the roads is always great. Making it productive is even better. Perhaps starting with making existing solar panels would be best, then as technology makes them more efficient and able to store and transmit energy enough to make it worth putting solar panels in other public areas, make those artistic as well.
Drug Treatment Rather Than Jail Time is an idea for drug offenders to be given rehabilitation while they are incarcerated. This isn't a new idea. I think the key issues with getting this started are twofold. First, someone would have to pay the drug treatment counselors. Second, effective treatment involves compassion, which is something our corrections system is not familiar with.
I wish the site had more feedback from users and better search functions. In addition, if a high school or undergrad teacher is going to require students to post ideas on a certain topic, they should be reviewed before they are posted. It seems like there are many ideas on similar themes that are not thought out and have a lot of spelling errors, etc. These clutter the site a bit.
Monday, December 5, 2011
Thursday, December 1, 2011
Spent
Spent is an online "game" of sorts that simulates the experiences and ups and downs of the budget for a person who is barely surviving economically. It is formatted well and easy to use and a great tool for helping people see how difficult it is to live on a low wage.
I don't think I learned much specific as far as new information from the site, but it did remind me of worries I have had at other times in my life, such as the grocery shopping exercise. Healthy foods are very expensive. It is easier to live off of soup, hot dogs and spaghetti than worry about fat, sodium and fiber content, which would require a sacrifice in other areas.
The game format was helpful to illustrate how the bank balance was going up or (mostly) down. The timeline to the right also helped emphasize how many days were left in the month. I also liked that the game gave feedback on the choices I made and what people typically do in the same situations.
I do not feel like the game was biased. There were some unfortunate circumstances, but they were all plausible and in life it does seem that we get kicked when we are down sometimes, even if it is just because we have less coping skills as things mount. In fact, I thought it was strange that while I did have a job there was no expense for childcare. Infant care usually starts at over $100 per week, which would have broken my bank. Also, the grocery shopping part did not say for how long I needed to shop, so I only spent $30, which, of course my child and I could never live on for a month. If anything, I think it was easier than real life.
Another group of citizens that could be represented by a virtual experience like this could be a person with a decent job and insurance that has a medical crisis and the issues they have to deal with such as missing work, insurance company denying claims, calls from collections, etc.
I really liked this and plan to share it with friends.
I don't think I learned much specific as far as new information from the site, but it did remind me of worries I have had at other times in my life, such as the grocery shopping exercise. Healthy foods are very expensive. It is easier to live off of soup, hot dogs and spaghetti than worry about fat, sodium and fiber content, which would require a sacrifice in other areas.
The game format was helpful to illustrate how the bank balance was going up or (mostly) down. The timeline to the right also helped emphasize how many days were left in the month. I also liked that the game gave feedback on the choices I made and what people typically do in the same situations.
I do not feel like the game was biased. There were some unfortunate circumstances, but they were all plausible and in life it does seem that we get kicked when we are down sometimes, even if it is just because we have less coping skills as things mount. In fact, I thought it was strange that while I did have a job there was no expense for childcare. Infant care usually starts at over $100 per week, which would have broken my bank. Also, the grocery shopping part did not say for how long I needed to shop, so I only spent $30, which, of course my child and I could never live on for a month. If anything, I think it was easier than real life.
Another group of citizens that could be represented by a virtual experience like this could be a person with a decent job and insurance that has a medical crisis and the issues they have to deal with such as missing work, insurance company denying claims, calls from collections, etc.
I really liked this and plan to share it with friends.
Friday, November 18, 2011
Book Review
Connected: The Surprising Power of Our Social Networks and How They Shape Our Lives -- How Your Friends' Friends' Friends Affect Everything You Feel, Think, and Do, written by Nicholas Christakis, a Harvard professor and his colleague from the University of California, San Diego, James Fowler, contends that people are influenced by and have great influence over the people in our social network, even if we have never met them. There have been other recent books on human connectedness and influence, such as Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point and the fields of behavioral health and health economics also have had recent popular research on social connectedness. This book, however, focuses on research that looks at not just the individual’s experience in society, but the overall structure of the network, and it treats the connection between two people as an area of study.
Their extensive scientific research is written here for a mass audience, and focuses on topics that readers will relate to, such as the social network’s influence obesity, deciding to have a child, eating disorders, suicide contagion, altruism and dying of a broken heart. Many of the topics discussed are commonly thought to be an individual’s complete responsibility, but the authors contend that much of what we do and think is because of what someone else is doing and thinking. Examining how networks are structured and how different people in the network are connected to the others can bring new insights into how innovation, trends and norms flow through the network.
The methods used to demonstrate the contentions are to discuss an idea, then give anecdotal evidence, then examine research that supports the idea, both from other studies and the author’s own research. This makes the book engaging and interesting. While I was reading it I often would turn to whomever was next to me and read entire paragraphs out loud to them, which demonstrates the level of excitement I had for the material. This book is a great introduction to the research topics, but is not an in-depth academic analysis, although it will entice some to follow it up by reading journal articles published from the research.
There are several main contentions in the book, which are woven throughout different topics. The first two are the ideas of Six Degrees of Separation Rule, that each person is connected to anyone else in the world via six connections, and the Three Degrees of Influence Rule, that the wave of influence we have extends to our friends’ friends’ friends before it dissipates. The idea of Six Degrees of Separation, according to the authors, means that each of us “can reach halfway to everyone else on the planet,” (p. 29). With the Three Degrees of Influence Rule, if each of the people in our network has 20 unique connections, we are able to influence 8,000 people.
The next two areas of study are the structure and function of networks, which is the shape the network, takes and the way information flows through it. These are demonstrated using plates that show how network visualization software creates a picture of a network, which are well explained and really enhance the reader’s ability to visualize the differences in types of networks. The two aspects of networks that are important to understand are connection, who is connected to whom, and contagion, what flows across the ties. Other ideas that permeate the book are that people obey rules which then determine the structure of the network they are in and that norms spread from person to person and can change over time.
One great example of how the authors have used existing research to examine networks is their use of the data from the Framingham Heart Study, which began in 1948 to study cardiovascular health. The researchers kept meticulous records of relations for those being studied in order to help find them every few years and many of the relations were also part of the study, which Christakis and Fowler were able to use to reconstruct the social networks of study participants and then use the data to see if there were signs of influence over their health, related to the health of those connected to them. They found that a person becoming obese often happened as those they were connected to gained weight as well, even if that person were three degrees away. Similar patterns were found regarding smoking and drinking.
When networks are viewed from a distance, hubs around central people can be seen that would not be apparent to someone within the network. For example, two people in a network may have similar characteristics and the same number of connections, but their position can be vastly different depending on how many connections their connections have. This visualization also makes it easy to see which people are on the periphery, like smokers and people experiencing loneliness. Looking at how those with certain behaviors are positioned and the structure of the network may be able to help design interventions more easily, as is demonstrated in the network based on information from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. It revealed that these high school students followed a rule that says “Don’t date your old partner’s current partner’s old partner,” (p. 99), which means they don’t swap partners with their best friend. This rule created a network that consists of a circle with long branches extending from it, making any student in the circle more susceptible to a sexually transmitted disease, even though they may have less partners than a person positioned on a branch of the network. Awareness of these networks can be useful in preventing the spread of any type of germ and allow those working on intervention target their educational efforts or vaccinations to the places and people that will have the most affect.
When the discussion begins to include online social networks, the research is more positive than the general consensus. Through a study of a neighborhood that was built with some homes that were connected via a fast broadband system and some that were not, it was found that those with the ability to connect to others online were not only more central to the network of their neighborhood, but stayed more connected to those in their former neighborhoods. This is a wonderful starting point for examining how technology widens our circle of acquaintances and allows relationships to continue that otherwise may not have.
The only shortcomings I found are in the lack of depth of the description of analysis which would be needed to put the ideas into practice. It would also be helpful to have included more discussion of criticisms and contentions of the ideas presented, as some are difficult to accept initially because they are counter intuitive. Although, to be fair, there are sixteen pages of notes in the back of the book with footnoted resources to support their claims, so anyone wanting to do more research can easily do so. To have included in-depth discussion of each contention would have made this into a textbook, which is not the intention.
I would highly recommend this book to anyone that is interested in human behavior, but especially to those studying or working in public administration because it changes the way we can examine how ideas flow from person to person, how actions of one can affect people they have not even met, how to focus on the ties between people and how an organization’s structure effects the outcome. It is also a great introduction into the ability to model networks and see them from an outside perspective that those in the network are not aware of.
These ideas could change the way those that serve the public and have the impossible task of solving “wicked problems” such as preparation for a natural disaster or pandemic. They also could fundamentally change the way we solve problems of inequalities of society, by focusing not just on a person’s situation inequalities, which are caused by their socio-economic status, but also on the positional inequalities, which have to do with their location in the network and who they know. Understanding this can help us create a more just society by finding ways to exploit the fact that those with money have more friends and having more friends leads to making more money and to connect more people to those that can help them.
Their extensive scientific research is written here for a mass audience, and focuses on topics that readers will relate to, such as the social network’s influence obesity, deciding to have a child, eating disorders, suicide contagion, altruism and dying of a broken heart. Many of the topics discussed are commonly thought to be an individual’s complete responsibility, but the authors contend that much of what we do and think is because of what someone else is doing and thinking. Examining how networks are structured and how different people in the network are connected to the others can bring new insights into how innovation, trends and norms flow through the network.
The methods used to demonstrate the contentions are to discuss an idea, then give anecdotal evidence, then examine research that supports the idea, both from other studies and the author’s own research. This makes the book engaging and interesting. While I was reading it I often would turn to whomever was next to me and read entire paragraphs out loud to them, which demonstrates the level of excitement I had for the material. This book is a great introduction to the research topics, but is not an in-depth academic analysis, although it will entice some to follow it up by reading journal articles published from the research.
There are several main contentions in the book, which are woven throughout different topics. The first two are the ideas of Six Degrees of Separation Rule, that each person is connected to anyone else in the world via six connections, and the Three Degrees of Influence Rule, that the wave of influence we have extends to our friends’ friends’ friends before it dissipates. The idea of Six Degrees of Separation, according to the authors, means that each of us “can reach halfway to everyone else on the planet,” (p. 29). With the Three Degrees of Influence Rule, if each of the people in our network has 20 unique connections, we are able to influence 8,000 people.
The next two areas of study are the structure and function of networks, which is the shape the network, takes and the way information flows through it. These are demonstrated using plates that show how network visualization software creates a picture of a network, which are well explained and really enhance the reader’s ability to visualize the differences in types of networks. The two aspects of networks that are important to understand are connection, who is connected to whom, and contagion, what flows across the ties. Other ideas that permeate the book are that people obey rules which then determine the structure of the network they are in and that norms spread from person to person and can change over time.
One great example of how the authors have used existing research to examine networks is their use of the data from the Framingham Heart Study, which began in 1948 to study cardiovascular health. The researchers kept meticulous records of relations for those being studied in order to help find them every few years and many of the relations were also part of the study, which Christakis and Fowler were able to use to reconstruct the social networks of study participants and then use the data to see if there were signs of influence over their health, related to the health of those connected to them. They found that a person becoming obese often happened as those they were connected to gained weight as well, even if that person were three degrees away. Similar patterns were found regarding smoking and drinking.
When networks are viewed from a distance, hubs around central people can be seen that would not be apparent to someone within the network. For example, two people in a network may have similar characteristics and the same number of connections, but their position can be vastly different depending on how many connections their connections have. This visualization also makes it easy to see which people are on the periphery, like smokers and people experiencing loneliness. Looking at how those with certain behaviors are positioned and the structure of the network may be able to help design interventions more easily, as is demonstrated in the network based on information from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. It revealed that these high school students followed a rule that says “Don’t date your old partner’s current partner’s old partner,” (p. 99), which means they don’t swap partners with their best friend. This rule created a network that consists of a circle with long branches extending from it, making any student in the circle more susceptible to a sexually transmitted disease, even though they may have less partners than a person positioned on a branch of the network. Awareness of these networks can be useful in preventing the spread of any type of germ and allow those working on intervention target their educational efforts or vaccinations to the places and people that will have the most affect.
When the discussion begins to include online social networks, the research is more positive than the general consensus. Through a study of a neighborhood that was built with some homes that were connected via a fast broadband system and some that were not, it was found that those with the ability to connect to others online were not only more central to the network of their neighborhood, but stayed more connected to those in their former neighborhoods. This is a wonderful starting point for examining how technology widens our circle of acquaintances and allows relationships to continue that otherwise may not have.
The only shortcomings I found are in the lack of depth of the description of analysis which would be needed to put the ideas into practice. It would also be helpful to have included more discussion of criticisms and contentions of the ideas presented, as some are difficult to accept initially because they are counter intuitive. Although, to be fair, there are sixteen pages of notes in the back of the book with footnoted resources to support their claims, so anyone wanting to do more research can easily do so. To have included in-depth discussion of each contention would have made this into a textbook, which is not the intention.
I would highly recommend this book to anyone that is interested in human behavior, but especially to those studying or working in public administration because it changes the way we can examine how ideas flow from person to person, how actions of one can affect people they have not even met, how to focus on the ties between people and how an organization’s structure effects the outcome. It is also a great introduction into the ability to model networks and see them from an outside perspective that those in the network are not aware of.
These ideas could change the way those that serve the public and have the impossible task of solving “wicked problems” such as preparation for a natural disaster or pandemic. They also could fundamentally change the way we solve problems of inequalities of society, by focusing not just on a person’s situation inequalities, which are caused by their socio-economic status, but also on the positional inequalities, which have to do with their location in the network and who they know. Understanding this can help us create a more just society by finding ways to exploit the fact that those with money have more friends and having more friends leads to making more money and to connect more people to those that can help them.
Thursday, October 13, 2011
eGovernment
The use of the internet to help the government become more efficient, effective and transparent seems, at first thought, to be the logical progression that would naturally save money and make information gathering and transactions easier for constituents. However, there are many things to be considered in e-governance that a business, for example, would not have to take into consideration. As was outlined by Richard Heeks in his article "Most e-Government-for-Development Projects Fail. How Can Risks be Reduced?" there are many costs to a failed e-government project that must be taken into consideration from the planning stages. They are direct financial costs, indirect financial costs, opportunity costs, political costs, beneficiary costs and future costs. In addition, there are heightened risks related to privacy concerns, security concerns and accessibility failure for impaired users. The issues around e-governance are best summarized by J. Bertot and E. Jaeger in their article "The E-Government paradox: Better customer service doesn't necessarily cost less" when they stated the following:
In short, citizen-centered E-Government is labor-intensive,is costly, and requires a range of expertise in research methods, qualitative and quantitative data analysis techniques, technologies, systems and application design, a fundamental understanding of what citizens want from E-Government, and an ability to elicit from citizens their needs from E-Government.
In order to assess how some innovative projects are approaching these challenges, I compared two websites with similar goals and compared them to websites established to be of high quality, such as whitehouse.gov, data.gov, recovery.gov and serve.gov. Both of the pages I evaluate are promoting local participation in green projects. The first is for a project called Energize Phoenix found at http://www.energizephx.com/. This is a project of the City of Phoenix that wants to promote installation of energy efficient projects and offers incentives to residential and business owners. The second is San Jose, California's Green Vision found at http://greenvision.sanjoseca.gov/. This is a city wide fifteen year plan for "economic growth, environmental sustainability, and an enhanced quality of life for its community."
Regarding transparency, the first thing I noticed when I compared the two websites to the quality baseline sites is that the San Jose Green Vision site clearly states at the top that it is affiliated with the City of San Jose and and URL is part of sanjoseca.gov. The Energize Phoenix site, on the other hand, is not formatted in the same way as the City of Phoenix web page and does not say at the top who produced the page, nor does the URL indicate any affiliation with the City of Phoenix. It does have, at the bottom of the page, logos with hyperlinks to the City of Phoenix, APS and ASU. Honestly, I think this only hurts the credibility of the site, because the logos are clearly copied and pasted in with poor formatting and the links only go to home pages, not to specific sites addressing the affiliations. The baseline sites all state clearly at the top what government agency they are affiliated with. The data.gov site even states "An Official Web Site of the United States Government." This is likely because some people may assume it is produced by a third party or an interest group, so it is intentionally put there to be clear that the information is backed by the federal government.
In evaluating for efficiency and effectiveness the Green Vision site is crisp and square with only a few colors and the goals and visions clearly listed on either side of the main picture. It only takes a few minutes to see the purpose and how citizens could be involved. It also shows progress that has been made with charts and has names, phone numbers and email addresses of individuals that can be contacted regarding each aspect of the goals.
The Energize Phoenix page, on the other hand, has a logo that is very colorful and not in line with the logos of any of the affiliated agencies or the City. The first page talks mostly about saving money and since part of the project involves having a private contractor from the approved list come to your house for an evaluation (that costs the homeowner $99) it could be mistaken for a third party site that is simply trying to get business for those contractors. There is a link that says there is financing available to assist with installation of energy saving measures, but the link opens a new window with the same web site, which, again, makes it seem like a site that is untrustworthy and only routing the user in circles in the same page. This page is also inefficient in that the eligible buildings are in a very restricted area of the city along the light rail corridor, but in order to find out if you qualify, a user has to submit their address and then get a message stating they don't. There should be a map of the coverage area to avoid wasting people's time as well as avoid asking people to input their address. If this were a site trying to sell something, the addresses could then be used for a mailing campaign or even to send people door to door to try to sell to interested parties. It only makes the site more suspicious.
I am not an expert in accessibility of web pages, and hadn't given it much thought until reading about Section 508, but I can see right off the bat that some of the sites do better than others. Recovery.gov has text sizing options and Serve.gov has a link to read the page in spanish. Neither the Green Vision nor the Energize Phoenix pages seem to have any alternate ways to view the page, although the Green Vision page is uncluttered and clean, while the Energize Phoenix web page has various colors in the background and inconsistent fonts and spacing. There also is no menu that links to all of the pages on the site, such as the financing page or the list of contractors, those both are found only in the text of other pages as hyperlinks.
Additional issues involving transparency and credibility have to do with the descriptions of the projects and funding. The Green Vision site has annual reports which state what has been done and what the goals are regarding job creation and funding from sources such as Recovery Act funding. It also has newsletters that discuss progress and how citizens can be involved. The Energize Phoenix web site states that it is funded with a "$25 million federal grant from the U.S. Department of Energy Better Buildings Neighborhood Program and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) to launch the Energize Phoenix program in partnership with Arizona State University and with support from Arizona Public Service. The Energize Phoenix program saves energy, creates jobs and will transform a diverse array of neighborhoods along a 10-mile stretch of the Metro light rail." It also lists as one of its goals, the creation of 2,000 jobs. The site does nothing to support these claims, but another city of Phoenix site shows that less than 12 jobs have been created/saved.
Overall, I would say that the company that built the Energize Phoenix web page was completely unfamiliar with the concepts outlined by Heeks, and further reinforces his idea that the fundamental issue with e-governance is a gap between the designers and the reality. The Green Vision site, since it was done in a similar fashion to the rest of the City of San Jose site, is more thought out and standardized, which gives it accessibility and credibility.
Thursday, September 29, 2011
Article Summary and Discussion of Technologies
Article:
I chose to review the article "The coming-out stories of anonymous bloggers," which was on cnn.com. The article talked about a couple of bloggers who were fired for what they wrote on their blogs. One wrote anonymously and another wrote with her real name. The important things to be aware of from this article is that it is less and less possible for a person to post anonymously online without someone being able to find out who you really are. In some ways, this is too bad, I think. NPR had a discussion last night talking about anonymous people on the web versus those that post under a pseudonym, or some prefer to think of it as a nom de plume, and have created and cultivated an image and personality for their writing. It is also one way people have found to bring up difficult or very personal subjects that they don't want to share. One instance where I think a person's right to remain anonymous should be protected is to be able to discuss health related issues. The support they may find on the web could be very beneficial, but their job may be threatened if their health problems were brought to the attention of their employer, especially if you work for a small employer.
Technology to solve a current Public Administration problem
As I touched on in my last post, I think the distribution of information to the public could be used much more effectively. Some recent examples are economic programs such as the Cash for Clunkers or New Home Buyers Credit programs. If there were multiple methods for people to understand what is available to them more people may take advantage of them. In addition, people who are using them would be better informed about the process and benefits. I know some people who used the New Home Buyers Credit without realizing they would pay it back on future taxes, and were not happy when they did have to begin repayment. Who had the incentive to inform them of this? Obviously, the realtor they dealt with did not. The Cash for Clunkers had to be administered by car dealers and there were lots of rumors of them taking advantage of customers or being uninformed about how it should work themselves and losing out on funding because they did not follow the process correctly. When the public has bad experiences like this, it erodes on the confidence people will have in government programs and contributes to the growing attitude that the government bureaucracy is an impediment to their lives.
There are many avenues that could be used to disseminate information better. The Governor's office could have blogs with videos as well as written content explaining what the public needs to know about each agency and popular programs. With all of the changes to the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System there are people that may be eligible for coverage not getting it. Their web site does have basic information, although many of the topic choices are similar, so one may be unclear where to look for their particular issue. It does not address what people can expect as the Affordable Care Act is implemented. People not eligible now may be eligible in the future and it is difficult to find out how that will work.
Some agencies are likely hesitant to post much information on the web because of a fear of misstating something and having a backlash from public that are angry or offended. Since we only seem to hear of stories of people getting in trouble over their internet usage, it does still seem like a scary place. This kind of activity is hidered by the legal system in the sense that people may be afraid of lawsuits, but I think it is largely encouraged by society because people search for everything now. It is so easy to have a question and use your phone to try to find the answer via a mobile browser and many people would prefer that to haivng to make a phone call.
Overall, many agencies and non profits are working hard to use cyberspace via blogs, twitter, facebook, etc., but don't have the resources to do it in an effective way. If they did put more resources there, they may be able to cut down on the face to face and phone time their employees spend answering questions.
I chose to review the article "The coming-out stories of anonymous bloggers," which was on cnn.com. The article talked about a couple of bloggers who were fired for what they wrote on their blogs. One wrote anonymously and another wrote with her real name. The important things to be aware of from this article is that it is less and less possible for a person to post anonymously online without someone being able to find out who you really are. In some ways, this is too bad, I think. NPR had a discussion last night talking about anonymous people on the web versus those that post under a pseudonym, or some prefer to think of it as a nom de plume, and have created and cultivated an image and personality for their writing. It is also one way people have found to bring up difficult or very personal subjects that they don't want to share. One instance where I think a person's right to remain anonymous should be protected is to be able to discuss health related issues. The support they may find on the web could be very beneficial, but their job may be threatened if their health problems were brought to the attention of their employer, especially if you work for a small employer.
Technology to solve a current Public Administration problem
As I touched on in my last post, I think the distribution of information to the public could be used much more effectively. Some recent examples are economic programs such as the Cash for Clunkers or New Home Buyers Credit programs. If there were multiple methods for people to understand what is available to them more people may take advantage of them. In addition, people who are using them would be better informed about the process and benefits. I know some people who used the New Home Buyers Credit without realizing they would pay it back on future taxes, and were not happy when they did have to begin repayment. Who had the incentive to inform them of this? Obviously, the realtor they dealt with did not. The Cash for Clunkers had to be administered by car dealers and there were lots of rumors of them taking advantage of customers or being uninformed about how it should work themselves and losing out on funding because they did not follow the process correctly. When the public has bad experiences like this, it erodes on the confidence people will have in government programs and contributes to the growing attitude that the government bureaucracy is an impediment to their lives.
There are many avenues that could be used to disseminate information better. The Governor's office could have blogs with videos as well as written content explaining what the public needs to know about each agency and popular programs. With all of the changes to the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System there are people that may be eligible for coverage not getting it. Their web site does have basic information, although many of the topic choices are similar, so one may be unclear where to look for their particular issue. It does not address what people can expect as the Affordable Care Act is implemented. People not eligible now may be eligible in the future and it is difficult to find out how that will work.
Some agencies are likely hesitant to post much information on the web because of a fear of misstating something and having a backlash from public that are angry or offended. Since we only seem to hear of stories of people getting in trouble over their internet usage, it does still seem like a scary place. This kind of activity is hidered by the legal system in the sense that people may be afraid of lawsuits, but I think it is largely encouraged by society because people search for everything now. It is so easy to have a question and use your phone to try to find the answer via a mobile browser and many people would prefer that to haivng to make a phone call.
Overall, many agencies and non profits are working hard to use cyberspace via blogs, twitter, facebook, etc., but don't have the resources to do it in an effective way. If they did put more resources there, they may be able to cut down on the face to face and phone time their employees spend answering questions.
Friday, September 23, 2011
eCommunities
This module was really exciting for me because it emphasizes how technology is allowing people to be more connected, rather than disconnected. That we are able to use the internet to find people that are sharing our experiences is a wonderful thing. The video on empathy emphasized this, how having compassion for each other builds connection with others and as it said "We show solidarity with our compassion."
I started using meetup.com after I had my daughter. Most of my friends didn't have kids yet and they were sick of me talking about diapers, vaccinations and preschools, so I found a group for other working moms. I did only meet with them once and the group ended up dying off, mostly because it takes quite a bit of effort to keep an online group going and one person had taken charge and just couldn't do it alone. I had a good experience, but did find it fascinating to see people's profiles and activities online and then meet them in person. Online most people seemed very extroverted and fun, but in person were more reserved. I don't know if that is because people who are more introverted are more likely to use the internet to find activities and other people to connect with, or just because the social pressures are greater in person, so people hold back more.
The video from Chris Anderson was really exciting and another one I could relate to, as I have used the internet to learn about photography and share photos with others. I have learned a great deal that I could not have learned from books alone. Photography classes can be expensive and time consuming, so I have been able to nurture a hobby on my own time. His point about "crowd accelerated innovation" was really fascinating, that cyberspace is a new ecosystem that will have everyone from doubters to innovators that will force new ideas or creations, be it dance, photography or other endeavors, to evolve and improve. I also really like the term he used to describe this: "Sparking off of each other." The image of a spark traveling from person to person is very powerful, and a good illustration of how each person can use that spark to create a fire, or let it die out.
Jamie Heywood's video and website are another really amazing example of people finding others that they can relate to online. When a person is suffering, from a medical issue, an emotional issue, or even more pragmatic things like a financial issue, finding communities where it is acceptable to talk about those things openly is very healing. Besides that, it is a great way to share information in a safe space where people can reveal a little more about themselves with less chance of judgement than if they tried to talk to friends or family members that have not experienced that issue.
Just yesterday afternoon I saw a really great example of how this can be used in a public administration setting. ASU's staff council had a women come do a presentation, which was broadcast live on the internet, about the Affordable Care Act. She does this on her own time to educate people about what they are entitled to and what resources are available to them. She has a web site with a 30 minute presentation. This is something that public administrators could be doing much more of. There are many things we would like to educate people about and as more and more people have access to the internet it would be silly not to take advantage of being able to offer resources to people who are searching for them at any time of the day.
I can see how a space, such as Second Life could be used to target communities and give a space for people to come together without leaving their homes. My first experience with Second Life was for this assignment and I have to say I was surprised at my reaction to it. I consider myself to be open to new ideas and technologies and not easily intimidated by them, but this experience was very intimidating for me. I think it was partly because it was happening in real time, rather than being like other blog communities or yahoo groups, where I could read and look around before I jumped in. Also, knowing the other avatars I saw were controlled by actual people made me nervous. When they got too close to me I got scared, as though I were in a dark parking lot and someone were following me. It was very odd. As I started to explore and enter different places I didn't know what the rules were or the protocol. I could see that others were chatting, they obviously knew each other. I wondered if they had met in person or in Second Life. I had a bit of a difficult time controlling the movement of my avatar and kept walking into things and then I was embarrassed that someone would see me, which was funny because I didn't think I would care about that. In the end, I am intrigued by it, and I would be interested in exploring the ability to use it for a new way to do conference calls or create forums to educate people on public policy issues, but I would feel like I need to spend a lot more time there to be comfortable. I don't know that learning to function in that world at this point would be the best focus for my attention and I can see there would likely be a lot of resistance from people who are less interested in cyberspace than I am.
I started using meetup.com after I had my daughter. Most of my friends didn't have kids yet and they were sick of me talking about diapers, vaccinations and preschools, so I found a group for other working moms. I did only meet with them once and the group ended up dying off, mostly because it takes quite a bit of effort to keep an online group going and one person had taken charge and just couldn't do it alone. I had a good experience, but did find it fascinating to see people's profiles and activities online and then meet them in person. Online most people seemed very extroverted and fun, but in person were more reserved. I don't know if that is because people who are more introverted are more likely to use the internet to find activities and other people to connect with, or just because the social pressures are greater in person, so people hold back more.
The video from Chris Anderson was really exciting and another one I could relate to, as I have used the internet to learn about photography and share photos with others. I have learned a great deal that I could not have learned from books alone. Photography classes can be expensive and time consuming, so I have been able to nurture a hobby on my own time. His point about "crowd accelerated innovation" was really fascinating, that cyberspace is a new ecosystem that will have everyone from doubters to innovators that will force new ideas or creations, be it dance, photography or other endeavors, to evolve and improve. I also really like the term he used to describe this: "Sparking off of each other." The image of a spark traveling from person to person is very powerful, and a good illustration of how each person can use that spark to create a fire, or let it die out.
Jamie Heywood's video and website are another really amazing example of people finding others that they can relate to online. When a person is suffering, from a medical issue, an emotional issue, or even more pragmatic things like a financial issue, finding communities where it is acceptable to talk about those things openly is very healing. Besides that, it is a great way to share information in a safe space where people can reveal a little more about themselves with less chance of judgement than if they tried to talk to friends or family members that have not experienced that issue.
Just yesterday afternoon I saw a really great example of how this can be used in a public administration setting. ASU's staff council had a women come do a presentation, which was broadcast live on the internet, about the Affordable Care Act. She does this on her own time to educate people about what they are entitled to and what resources are available to them. She has a web site with a 30 minute presentation. This is something that public administrators could be doing much more of. There are many things we would like to educate people about and as more and more people have access to the internet it would be silly not to take advantage of being able to offer resources to people who are searching for them at any time of the day.
I can see how a space, such as Second Life could be used to target communities and give a space for people to come together without leaving their homes. My first experience with Second Life was for this assignment and I have to say I was surprised at my reaction to it. I consider myself to be open to new ideas and technologies and not easily intimidated by them, but this experience was very intimidating for me. I think it was partly because it was happening in real time, rather than being like other blog communities or yahoo groups, where I could read and look around before I jumped in. Also, knowing the other avatars I saw were controlled by actual people made me nervous. When they got too close to me I got scared, as though I were in a dark parking lot and someone were following me. It was very odd. As I started to explore and enter different places I didn't know what the rules were or the protocol. I could see that others were chatting, they obviously knew each other. I wondered if they had met in person or in Second Life. I had a bit of a difficult time controlling the movement of my avatar and kept walking into things and then I was embarrassed that someone would see me, which was funny because I didn't think I would care about that. In the end, I am intrigued by it, and I would be interested in exploring the ability to use it for a new way to do conference calls or create forums to educate people on public policy issues, but I would feel like I need to spend a lot more time there to be comfortable. I don't know that learning to function in that world at this point would be the best focus for my attention and I can see there would likely be a lot of resistance from people who are less interested in cyberspace than I am.
Friday, September 16, 2011
News Story Analysis
Last month BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) turned off access to cell services when there was a threat of a protest. The month before there had been a protest that turned violent in response to an incident that involved the transit police killing a man. The article from the Washington Post can be found here.
As is stated in the article, cell service was only turned off at stations where the BART authorities believed protests were likely, and service at those stations is normally available because of an agreement the agency has with cell phone providers in order to have a signal on the platforms and in the train cars. The BART statement states that "Paid areas of BART stations are reserved for ticketed passengers who are boarding, exiting or waiting for BART cars and trains, or for authorized BART personnel. No person shall conduct or participate in assemblies or demonstrations or engage in other expressive activities in the paid areas of BART stations, including BART cars and trains and BART station platforms."
Apparently, BART believed that turning off access to cell phones would make it more difficult for protesters to use social media to organize and coordinate the time and location of protest activities. Some are saying that what BART did was an infringement on the First Amendment. According to the Christian Science Monitor the Federal Communications Commission does not allow jamming of cell phones, but it does allow a service to be turned off.
The behavior in question here is the right of people to express themselves (free speech) via social media and the right of people to protest. These activities are normally regulated in various ways by the four constraints detailed by Lessing in Chapter 7 of Code 2.0. The law regulates the ability of people to express and opinion and even to demonstrate in a peaceful way, but there is no law that says BART must continue their agreement to provide cell service on their platforms and trains. Social norms regulate people saying unpopular things and acting unruly to a point, but there had been innocent bystanders affected by the previous protests that had taken place, so this obviously is not enough to protect the public from possible violence. Train platforms are an especially dangerous place for unruly behavior. The market can also constrain behavior and in this case that is relatively limited because cell phones with access to social media have become affordable to most people in San Francisco. Only people who can't afford one would be constrained here by the market alone. The largest constraint in this situation is the architecture of the infrastructure providing the cellular service within the areas controlled by BART. They took full advantage of the power this gave them. The question is whether they should have.
The values that are in conflict in this case are public safety versus the right to free speech and public safety versus the right of paying BART customers to have cellular access. I don't believe there is any conflict of the right for people to demonstrate because they were still free to do so in public places, it only limited a tool they could have used to organize, but people were able to organize demonstrations before social media existed.
For BART the conflict is mostly a political and public relations conflict. If they chose to shut down the cell service, it would result in the appearance that they are being oppressive and that an amenity they have been providing to their customers cannot be depended on. On the other hand, if another protest had taken place and it resulted in violence again, people may start to feel that BART is not doing enough to keep their customers safe. There is another element that makes this more complicated and that is BART is partially funded by sales and property taxes, as well as some federal funds, such as ARRA funds they received last year. If this were a purely private company and the service was shut down on private property, it would be relatively clear to me that it is legal and acceptable. Since the space is partially publicly funded, there has to be more consideration made to how people's rights can be limited there. The fact the certain areas are only for ticketed customers further confuses the issue. I also briefly considered that there is an interference with commerce, but then realized that the cellular companies are not really losing money as a result of this action, since most people pay for the service at a flat rate, whether they have reception or not.
An alternative approach I would suggest would be for the BART to use the communication through social media organizing the protests to deploy additional transit police to those stations and platforms to be sure no violence occurred. This would solve the issue of looking oppressive to the constituents in the five counties that fund the BART and would also show the people riding the BART that there was a clear, visible attempt to maintain order and safety. In conjunction with this approach, BART could ramp up their own social media and mobile web campaign to try to dissuade those who were considering protesting and warning if certain stations did become unsafe via their SMS alerts. This alternative would have been more costly financially because of the additional salaries for officers and staff, which would be seen as a values conflict to some when spending more tax money in the current economic environment.
When I first heard about BART turning off cell service my reaction was that it was not an appropriate response. This was probably because I personally feel safer when I have access to my cell service and the thought that a company or government agency would decide I should not be able to have it is frightening. After I thought about it, though, I realized that we already give up that ability when traveling on air planes. The information that convinced me that BART's reaction was appropriate was learning more about where and when the cell service was interrupted. It was for a limited time and in limited stations and the service is only normally available there because of a special agreement, so I think it was an appropriate action. Additionally, no protest did take place that day, although there have been additional protests since, which are now not just by the initial shooting but also the decision to shut down cellular service.
As is stated in the article, cell service was only turned off at stations where the BART authorities believed protests were likely, and service at those stations is normally available because of an agreement the agency has with cell phone providers in order to have a signal on the platforms and in the train cars. The BART statement states that "Paid areas of BART stations are reserved for ticketed passengers who are boarding, exiting or waiting for BART cars and trains, or for authorized BART personnel. No person shall conduct or participate in assemblies or demonstrations or engage in other expressive activities in the paid areas of BART stations, including BART cars and trains and BART station platforms."
Apparently, BART believed that turning off access to cell phones would make it more difficult for protesters to use social media to organize and coordinate the time and location of protest activities. Some are saying that what BART did was an infringement on the First Amendment. According to the Christian Science Monitor the Federal Communications Commission does not allow jamming of cell phones, but it does allow a service to be turned off.
The behavior in question here is the right of people to express themselves (free speech) via social media and the right of people to protest. These activities are normally regulated in various ways by the four constraints detailed by Lessing in Chapter 7 of Code 2.0. The law regulates the ability of people to express and opinion and even to demonstrate in a peaceful way, but there is no law that says BART must continue their agreement to provide cell service on their platforms and trains. Social norms regulate people saying unpopular things and acting unruly to a point, but there had been innocent bystanders affected by the previous protests that had taken place, so this obviously is not enough to protect the public from possible violence. Train platforms are an especially dangerous place for unruly behavior. The market can also constrain behavior and in this case that is relatively limited because cell phones with access to social media have become affordable to most people in San Francisco. Only people who can't afford one would be constrained here by the market alone. The largest constraint in this situation is the architecture of the infrastructure providing the cellular service within the areas controlled by BART. They took full advantage of the power this gave them. The question is whether they should have.
The values that are in conflict in this case are public safety versus the right to free speech and public safety versus the right of paying BART customers to have cellular access. I don't believe there is any conflict of the right for people to demonstrate because they were still free to do so in public places, it only limited a tool they could have used to organize, but people were able to organize demonstrations before social media existed.
For BART the conflict is mostly a political and public relations conflict. If they chose to shut down the cell service, it would result in the appearance that they are being oppressive and that an amenity they have been providing to their customers cannot be depended on. On the other hand, if another protest had taken place and it resulted in violence again, people may start to feel that BART is not doing enough to keep their customers safe. There is another element that makes this more complicated and that is BART is partially funded by sales and property taxes, as well as some federal funds, such as ARRA funds they received last year. If this were a purely private company and the service was shut down on private property, it would be relatively clear to me that it is legal and acceptable. Since the space is partially publicly funded, there has to be more consideration made to how people's rights can be limited there. The fact the certain areas are only for ticketed customers further confuses the issue. I also briefly considered that there is an interference with commerce, but then realized that the cellular companies are not really losing money as a result of this action, since most people pay for the service at a flat rate, whether they have reception or not.
An alternative approach I would suggest would be for the BART to use the communication through social media organizing the protests to deploy additional transit police to those stations and platforms to be sure no violence occurred. This would solve the issue of looking oppressive to the constituents in the five counties that fund the BART and would also show the people riding the BART that there was a clear, visible attempt to maintain order and safety. In conjunction with this approach, BART could ramp up their own social media and mobile web campaign to try to dissuade those who were considering protesting and warning if certain stations did become unsafe via their SMS alerts. This alternative would have been more costly financially because of the additional salaries for officers and staff, which would be seen as a values conflict to some when spending more tax money in the current economic environment.
When I first heard about BART turning off cell service my reaction was that it was not an appropriate response. This was probably because I personally feel safer when I have access to my cell service and the thought that a company or government agency would decide I should not be able to have it is frightening. After I thought about it, though, I realized that we already give up that ability when traveling on air planes. The information that convinced me that BART's reaction was appropriate was learning more about where and when the cell service was interrupted. It was for a limited time and in limited stations and the service is only normally available there because of a special agreement, so I think it was an appropriate action. Additionally, no protest did take place that day, although there have been additional protests since, which are now not just by the initial shooting but also the decision to shut down cellular service.
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