One of the most gratifying examples of government engagement with the online community was the transformation of COI's browser guidelines from a self-contradictory, over-long and unworkable draft to a sensible and practical final document, thanks largely to online consultation with the online audience. Yes, I know it sounds obvious, but...
Eight months later, and after further trialling, it's great to see COI now looking to build on this momentum with the launch of a new Digigov blog, and a promise to 'share information and get feedback on digital policy across government and to stimulate debate around digital policy with other departments, agencies, web developers, bloggers and academics.' There's only an introductory post up there for the moment, so I'll be watching with interest.
For the record - it's running on WordPress, the standard version rather than MU as far as I can tell, and uses a custom theme - a one-off rather than a generic COI style - by Harry Metcalfe's The Dextrous Web. (Note to self: must stop linking to the competition.) It's another government endorsement of WordPress, and another endorsement of the value of true openness after the disappointment of the internal-only CivilBlogs.
Welcome aboard, guys. Now let's make some good things happen.
I just love that it's a feminine pink too. Another 'barrier-breaker'.
Thanks Simon. We'll try our best to keep the momentum going.... really pleased with the response so far, particularly from fellow bloggers
[...] The initial reaction from bloggers seems good. Positive noises from paulcanning, Simon Dickson at Puffbox, and Neil Williams at Mission Creep suggest if Digigov lives up to its promising start it could [...]