SiteCrafting, Inc.

It seems the US Government has finally decided to join the rest of us here in the 21st century. Last Thursday our friends in that other Washington launched Data.gov which suggests a promising future for a transparent government on the web.



While many of the latest changes in Washington DC have sparked quite a bit of political debate, one recent change has developers on both the left and the right buzzing with excitement. The launch of Data.gov is the start of an effort to make the vast ocean of data our government collects more accessible and more easily found by publishing it in one central location.

Currently, the site has launched with a limited amount of initial data, though it is the first step in what will hopefully be a very successful endeavor. The site currently provides an handful of datasets from various government departments, containg everything from energy consumption and population statistics to births, deaths, marriages and divorces.

Most of what Data.gov has to offer is more useful to developers directly. This doesn't mean that will remain the case for long. After all, writing applications and playing with data are two of the things developers love most. This is really the most brilliant part about this project. Rather than devoting time and taxpayer resources to build sites and tools that use this information, it is made publicly available in a raw format that can easily be sliced and diced for any purpose the public sees fit. That's right ladies and gents, our government is crowdsourcing!