The Future is in the Palm of our Hands

One of my favorite strategic planning quotes is from Wayne Gretzky.  He said, "I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been."  A recent Morgan Stanley report on Internet trends, gives us a lot of data on where the puck will be and the direction in which we should … Continue reading The Future is in the Palm of our Hands

Pork and Fort Sumter: New Ways of Relating to our Documents

At the National Archives and Records Administration, our unique role as the nation's records keeper is critical to the success of the President's open government initiative.  Our work serves American democracy by safeguarding and preserving the records of our Government, ensuring that the people can discover, use, and learn from this documentary heritage.  I think … Continue reading Pork and Fort Sumter: New Ways of Relating to our Documents

The Importance of Being Earnest (About Records Management)

I have said it before in a number of venues and I will say it again here, records management is the backbone of Open Government.  Without effective records management by all Federal agencies, the long-term success of the Open Government Initiative, not to mention the preservation and access of the permanently valuable records of the … Continue reading The Importance of Being Earnest (About Records Management)

Tweets: What We Might Learn From Mundane Details.

Have you heard the news?  This week, the Library of Congress announced that they are acquiring the digital archive of public tweets.  On April 14, @librarycongress tweeted, "Library to acquire ENTIRE Twitter archives -- All public tweets, ever, since March 2006!"  Congratulations, Library of Congress. In the world of electronic records, this is a historic … Continue reading Tweets: What We Might Learn From Mundane Details.

Cultivating Citizen Archivists

Recently, NASA launched an online project called "Be A Martian."  At first glance, this website is a highly sophisticated public education tool that creates an online experience to connect the public with NASA's mission.  On closer inspection, this is also an important crowdsourcing project.  The public is invited to participate as "citizen scientists" by aligning Mars … Continue reading Cultivating Citizen Archivists

No Small Change

The Pew Research Center recently published a report, “The Impact of the Internet on Institutions in the Future,” in which it found that 72 percent of experts agreed with the statement: By 2020, innovative forms of online cooperation will result in significantly more efficient and responsive governments, business, non-profits, and other mainstream institutions. That optimism … Continue reading No Small Change