transparent

President Obama has repeatedly called for more transparency in government, and Web archivist Carl Malamud thinks he can help the president actually achieve that.

With the support of some prominent Internet activists, Malamud has launched a campaign at YesWeScan.org to convince the president to charge him with the task of running the Government Printing Office, the department responsible for providing public access to a variety of federal work products.

Malamud has plenty of experience facilitating public access to government documents, much to the chagrin of public officials. He has butted heads with government entities in his quest to get … Read more

This free tool performs one function and one function only: it lets users adjust the transparency of any active window. But for such a simple task, we found its performance sketchy at best.

Windows Alpha Blender settings can be accessed by right-clicking on the taskbar icon and selecting the Properties option. The sparse menu that appears offers vague instructions. There is some guidance for adjusting the transparency, which requires using two hotkey combinations. There is also a slide bar for adjusting the transparency level. Once we selected our transparency level, we used the hotkey combinations to turn the transparency action … Read more

Almost three years after Jeff Howe coined the term in his seminal article "The Rise of Crowdsourcing," and, ironically, in the very week 1,300 handpicked scientists, entrepreneurs, artists, and other thinkers, movers, and shakers assembled at the TED conference in Long Beach, the term "crowdsourcing" yielded more than 1 million search results on Google.

That's quite an accomplishment. Crowdsourcing is no longer an exclusive noun for a few in the know, it has become a verb for the crowd. Mom-and pop shops, SME's, and large corporations, receptionists, interns, middle managers, and CEOs – everyone'… Read more

Trendwatching gets it right (again): "Giving is the new taking, and sharing is the new giving." That's the key assertion in this month's trend briefing, which describes the characteristics of Generation G (for generosity) and offers eight ways for brands to join: from Tryvertising to Brand Butlers to Random Acts of Kindness (RAK).… Read more

In the face of mounting criticism over its change to its terms of service, Facebook has reverted to its original terms of service, and CEO Mark Zuckerberg issued an apology. It's a nice about-face, but it also misses the point.

The point, as Techdirt intimates, is transparency.

It's hard to think that nobody at Facebook anticipated it and took some proactive steps to address the changes and attempt to allay concerns and preclude the overreaction.

Instead, Zuckerberg responds only after the fuss has been kicked up, and his explanation comes off as damage control, regardless of the motivations … Read more

Given how poorly the government seems to do with spending money (feeble-minded stimulus bill, anyone?), it's refreshing to hear about TransparencyCamp, an effort to "remix the geeks and the wonks so we can integrate transparency with policy in the government."

It's a laudable goal--one to be welcomed as technology CEOs lobby the U.S. federal government for policies and "stimuli" favorable to themselves.

This "unconference" has already assembled some stellar participants, including Tim O'Reilly of O'Reilly Media, Apache luminary Brian Behlendorf, Bob Biersack of the Federal Election Commission, USA.gov … Read more

As President Obama's $825+ billion financial stimulus package works its way through Congress, a number of groups have started to call for increased transparency in the way that data on the proposed spending will be shared with citizens.

Most noteworthy are demands from public-interest groups and academics that the the data be provided in a format conducive to user-generated mashups and remixes.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 passed through the House Appropriations Committee a couple weeks ago, and it is expected to come up for a full House vote in the coming weeks.

In addition to … Read more

There may finally be a compromise between the world of ever-shrinking electronic devices and our ever-expanding fingers.

A prototype device called the NanoTouch features a 2.4-inch screen and a touch-sensitive pad of the same size on the back, according to a video demonstration on NewScientist.

Using the touch pad on the back, users can manipulate icons on the screen in front without obscuring the target with their fingers, creating an experience resembling transparency.

Researchers say tests showed that targets as small as seven-tenths of an inch wide were easy to select using the NanoTouch. Targets on conventional touch screens … Read more

Should members of the public be able to pay for Web advertisements detailing which companies have donated to politicians? While this seems like a great way to promote transparency in politics, Google forbids the practice--we are free to name the politicians who take money but cannot name the companies that give it.

With Google's domination of the search engine market, and the eyeballs that go along with it, the company's AdWords text ads have become a key way for activists, politicians, and corporations to reach the general public. However, over the past year, Google's excessively restrictive policies … Read more