On the heels of his impressive web marketing campaign and a subsequent 4-week quiet period in communications, Barack Obama has launched his presidential transition website: Change.gov - The Office of the President-Elect.
It's buggy but that hasn't stopped over 3,000 people from responding to the Transition Team's first question: "How is the current economic crisis affecting you?" As expected, the site goes beyond a simple "tell us what you think" blog. Obama is also inviting every American -- and Canadian, oddly -- to take our Seat At The Table where we'll have access to Transition Team documents and community discussions.
Missed Obama's televised weekend address where he discussed key parts of his economic recovery plan and stimulus package? You'll find it on this site, complete with the full transcript. Ready to organize a community discussion on Health Care reform? The Obama machine has begun recruiting. Want the government org chart? This site will link you there.
After gathering 13 million email addresses, 4.4 million Facebook and MySpace friends, and 1M mobile subscribers, the Obama team has an unprecedented invitation for ongoing 1-to-1 dialogue with the public. Will Federal election rules allow President Obama to communicate directly with these supporters as Candidate Obama did? Many of us have been asking what an empowered Government 2.0 will look like. We're about to find out.
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also - from what i can tell from my own experience and friends, canadians have been increasingly unabashedly stoked about obama and his plans and his invitation to be part of the process. we've been signing up for his newsletters and social network and sending him feedback wanting to get in on more of the 'making the world ok again' action so though it may seem odd to americans at first that he would explicitly include another country's citizens to have a seat at the table, even if we share the biggest border and are each others largest trade partner, i'd suggest getting used to it. the whole world is going to want to have a piece of this movement if/when it really gets going.
I’m Canadian too – typing this from Toronto right now - and I’m following this closely. My interest in the Obama campaign started first from a web marketing perspective but I couldn’t help getting drawn in. It didn’t shock me that I was able to join the my.barackobama.com online community, but I was surprised Change.gov included a postal code entry. I was assuming I’d be welcomed into a candidate campaign but the President-Elect site would be U.S.-only. Glad it isn’t.
Thx for the comment.
More pdf dead ends at http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/ that presents the president's management agenda as a collection of .pdfs
Change will be measured by how far P-e Obama's management agenda can be navigated down through implementing levels to see action and monitor results or simply see how things and functions are structured.
http://change.gov/agenda/ Is a page of agenda items with no links yet. Every agenda item will go live on the new whitehouse.gov site after 20 Jan. How far down we the public can link then and thereafter through the cabinet and implementing organizations will tell us how much 2.0 we are getting.
2.0 stops at the first pdf that has no link connecting it to anything.
Everything is connected. 2.0 does not even stop where the rubber meets the road. That is where the feedback loop starts to the steering wheel.
My first 2.0 rule would be that a pdf in the agenda system that links to nothing is nothing. Whoever "owns" that pdf changes it to link to supporting programs and to feedback or they are "changed" because they are also dead end.
Regarding the site's Web 2.0-ishness, there’s nothing interactive about pdf's but that’s the point. Some documents – especially something like a government org chart – should only be viewed, not commented on and not even necessarily shared, tagged, , sent-to-a-friend, or favourited.
In my mind a site is Web 2.0 when it serves as a many-to-many communications platform. An architecture of participation. With Change.gov’s sections like “join the discussionâ€, “your seat at the tableâ€, and “host a health care discussion†it easily qualifies.