Pioneering Spirit

December 21, 2024

The need to employ and empower expertise inside government to actually deliver results

Below are a pair of excellent excerpts from recently released reports. Both are well worth reading in full. "The folly of skimping on internal core competence is well established in many domains. One paper by Zachary Liscow of Yale finds a remarkable correlation between the staffing levels of state departments of transportation and the per-mile construction cost of highways: increasing employment by one person per thousand in a population reduces costs by 26 percent.28 When there is insuffici...

#cat#state#capacity#digital#government

December 18, 2024

What if... we built truly digitally native public institutions from the ground up

O1.5 decades ago, Code for America launched it's flagship fellowship. Featuring a who's who cast of tech industry luminaries like the US Federal CTO, Twitter Co-Founder and Mark Zuckerberg, the short video harkens back to an earlier, more idealistic age. (Mark then was a golden boy of American innovation, rather than the battle scarred CEO of a company often likened to the tobacco companies.) It also brings a spirit that's well worth remembering. The series of tech icons ask "what if" best in...

#civic#tech#cfa#digital#government#institutions

December 15, 2024

Review: Tom Kalil on Institutions for Innovation

Tom Kalil, a pivotal science policy appointee in the Clinton and Obama administrations, recently went on the Hear This Idea podcast, a node in the Effective Altruist network.

#innovations#institutions#metascience#policy#dinosaurs

December 14, 2024

Introducing the California Alternative Transformation (CAT) principles for moar efficient, effective and imaginative government operations v0.1

The Meme Lords are rallying, with the DOGE Techno King and his digital court scheming their next big gambit. The internet's good citizens face a choice: cheer from the sidelines or chart a better path. Let's talk CATs, not DOGE.From our AI Oracles: “Here’s an image of a regal Shiba Inu wielding a scepter and playfully smashing the Capitol.”Putting the future of American government in the hands of a self-styled “Techno-King” seems, uh, mildly antithetical to the spirit of 1776. Not to mention ...

#doge#cat#us#future#america#gov_ops#government#digital#transformation

December 14, 2024

Introducing Data Sophistry

~1.5 decades ago data science became a hot term. The title was originally created because Facebook wanted a talented scientist to work for them but the prospect didn’t want to have a lowly “analyst” title. Thus the term data scientist was born. A few O’Reilly articles and copycat companies and the title quickly grew in popularity.The title rode a big wave. Tech companies were creating more and more data from all the actions people took online, creating a big need to make sense of all that inf...

December 12, 2024

The unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics

The latest issue of Works in Progress has a choice essay out on how mathematics built the modern world. As a onetime major in the subject and longtime fan of the purest arena of human inquiry[1], an area that is simultaneously neither an art nor science yet instrumental and in another light composed of both: Most of the significant inventions of the Industrial Revolution were not undergirded by a deep scientific understanding, and their inventors were not scientists. The standard chronology i...

#math#computation#industrial#revolution#impact#civilization

December 10, 2024

Integrated water data infrastructure, taking stock a decade later

In 2014, the California Council on Science and Technology (CCST) released the an assessment of innovation opportunities in the water sector, including this clarion call to: Develop and implement an integrated water information management system for water supplies, uses, and quality including precipitation, runoff, and storage; for surface water, groundwater, and water use… Near-Term Actions: The Governor and key agencies should immediately take the lead to form a consortium of parties, includ...

#water#data#consortium#state#california#digital#transformation

December 9, 2024

Beyond America's* uncivil war

A decade ago, in a city far, far away, my co-founder insisted that I watch A Ted Talk. Not just any pop idea monger mind you, but a bonafied Chief Belief Officer, Devdutt Pattanaik, sharing about the mythological differences between East and West. Devdutt's story begins with a race between two brothers three times around the world. One went around the globe, the other waited until the first brother had completed two very long laps and then calmly walked around their parents. That brother then...

#uncivil_war#us#politics#local#home#world#ted#myths

December 7, 2024

Lessons from Microsoft's triumphant turnaround

Wired's latest cover story details Microsoft's transformation from a moribund has-been technological giant reaping the rent from yesterdays innovations to a leading edge company pioneering the future once again. Today the company is once again one of the world's most valuable companies, currently ranked third globally. Not too long ago the company was adrift. “Nadella doesn’t say outright what everyone in the room knows: Just a decade ago, pundits had declared the company brain-dead.”Today, u...

#microsoft#enterprise#tech#company#turnaround#open_source

November 30, 2024

Rekindling cafeterias as a cultural commons

I recently started working at Metropolitan Water District of Southern California. Located downtown by Union Station, the District's headquarters has a great cafeteria. Quality, dependable food at affordable prices. When I interned at Met seventeen years ago and was running the CA data collaborative a half decade ago, it was cool to see the many people from many walks of life who'd come to the Met cafeteria for a meal. It was right across a nice plaza from Union station.Today that cafeteria re...

#commons#civic#reform#connection#community