Terrific happenings in the governing and citizen related Web

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Tim O’Reilly: Radical Transparency: The New Federal IT Dashboard (and check out the site itself at it.usaspending.gov)

Data.gov iteratively grows from 47 to 100,000 data feeds (source Atrios)

EveryBlock blog: EveryBlock source code released

Tim Bray: “Hello World” for Open Data – Tim Bray reviews, and is inspired by, happenings in Vancover.

And locally SEPTA has started to work with Google to help riders plan trips online

A huge round of thanks needs to go to the folks behind iSepta for showing just what is possible.

This and more was discussed at this year’s Personal Democracy Forum – which I missed, which I hopefully won’t next year. Sounds like it was a great event.

Related:

O’Reilly radar: John Geraci: The Four Pillars of an Open Civic System

Ignite Philly 2: Geoff DiMassi and Paul Wright “Open Source Philadelphia”

IllustrativeProgramming

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Martin Fowler coins a useful term: “Illustrative Programming”: languages that “fuse the execution of the program together with its definition”. “Illustrative programming requires information from the actual running of the program.” He uses Excel as an example.

I think MIT’s Scratch provides an example of this as well. I need to pass it along.

Challenging conventional wisdom about the direction of media

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New Yorker: Malcolm Gladwell: Priced to Sell – a scathing review of Wired’s Chris Anderson’s new book “Free: The Future of a Radical Price” and the concepts promoted within.

NYTimes: Keeping News of Kidnapping Off Wikipedia – the NYTimes coordinated with Wikipedia staff to keep a factual event from appearing on the service.

Say Everything: Chapter One: Putting Everything Out There [Justin Hall]: a review of Justin Hall’s history and his efforts on the Web. How they laid the foundation for all that came later.

NiemanJournalismLab: Four crowdsourcing lessons from the Guardian’s (spectacular) expenses-scandal experiment

Scott Rosenberg: Salon.com IPO: It was ten years ago today

Chris Anderson (not Wired’s): We’ve Been Living Through a Twitter Revolution for the Last 10 Years

Michael Jackson’s reach was across generations, across the seas

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YouTube: (Michael Jackson) Billie Jean – Sungha Jung:

Wow.

I had posted the following to Twitter, but it belongs here:

“11 years old, standing on chestnut st. near 11th, outside store, watching tvs play Thriller thru a window. that was me.”

Michael Jackson’s death triggered moments of reflection for many. So many that services across the Web struggled to stay functional as people either reached out for news, or to share their memories with one another.

He stands as a kind of Rorschach test. What you think of him and his contributions to music and entertainment are dependent on you – the information published about him you cared to absorb, rationalize, relate to, or reject.

He was a force. He left an imprint.

YouTube: Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean” cover by Amanda Palmer (live):

Some links:

WNEW.com: The Epic of Michael Jackson

Metafilter: Ongoing thread

Attytood: The Love You Save: Michael Jackson and the rear-guard Baby Boomers

NPR.org: Michael Jackson: Life Of A Pop Icon

Susie Madrak: The Life and Death of Michael Jackson

Jeneane Sessum: Have You Seen My Childhood

Comcaster Scott Westerman: Michael Jackson’s place in the pantheon of our lives

Lisa Marie Presley: He Knew.

CSMonitor: Outpouring over Michael Jackson unlike anything since Princess Di

Koax! Koax! Koax! (via boing boing): Some thoughts on Michael Jackson

YouTube: I’ll Be There Acapella:

And lastly, a very deep thought by co-worker John: “The Michael Jackson we knew died a long time ago”

Two Links on Car Repairs, Crashes, and Infrastructure

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Mr. Aaron Held: Designing a new Infrastructure is like buying a new car:

** You usually start this process due to a crash **

code: User gen data + no cache eviction = FAIL
car : SUV from the side + swerve = One less Stop sign.

Shelley Powers: Car Repair:

Car repair is not a linear progression, with incidents sweetly spaced so as to remind us, gently, that nothing lasts forever.

It is an aggregation of aggravation, where one failure begets another, in clumps timed to crest when your wallet is flattest.

A Blogging History Worth Reading?

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I’m really looking forward to reading Scott Rosenberg’s “Say Everything”.

I’m sure “Say Everything” will be a book I can share with others (which I do with “Dreaming in Code”) to provide them insight into why I do some of the things I do and why I get so damn passionate about them.

Writing a book on blogging’s history and how it related to the Web, Internet, and society is a difficult task. Based upon excerpts I’ve read so far, Rafe’s review of the first half, and reading his fantastic “Dreaming in Code”, I know this book is going to be terrific and insightful.

Speaking of blogging, I got to agree with Rafe – the most awesome thing about blogging *is* “corresponding with so many of the people I met through blogging back then here, on Twitter, and elsewhere.”.

Absolutely.

Thank you Web.