social media

NRC Pursues BYOD Plans

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The Nuclear Regulatory Commission will allow its 4,000 employees to use their own iPads and iPhones for work later this year as the agency embraces a new federal digital strategy to reform federal mobility, websites and the sharing of digital services.

Darren Ash, the NRC’s Deputy Executive Director for Corporate Management in charge of the agency’s mobile policy, said the decision to overhaul the way the NRC works with mobile devices aligns with the federal strategy announced Wednesday to increase the mobility of federal workers in a move to improve productivity and lower costs. Keep reading →

 /  Published May 29, 2012 at 7:00 AM

VanRoekel, Park Dive Deeper Into Digital Strategy

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Fresh off of a splashy announcement of the new federal digital strategy in New York, Federal Chief Information Officer Steven VanRoekel and Federal Chief Technology Officer Todd Park described some of the details of the plan on home turf Thursday.

The pair addressed about 200 government insiders at an event hosted by the ACT-IAC and AFFIRM in a Department of Interior auditorium. (Watch the recorded video.) Keep reading →

 /  Published May 24, 2012 at 7:00 PM

Security, Cloud Key To Nuclear Security Agency’s New IT Infrastructure

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Security, mobility and social networking are driving a new vision within the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) that’s led the department to embrace cloud computing.

This fall, the component within the Department of Energy that is responsible for the security and reliability of the nation’s stockpile of nuclear weapons will begin rolling out a major component of its new Network Vision – YourCloud. Keep reading →

 /  Published May 17, 2012 at 2:05 PM

Government’s Virtual Worlds Go On Display

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The virtual worlds operated by federal agencies are evolving in several directions and many of them — including more than 20 government virtual world projects — will be on display this week, May 16-18, at the 6th Federal Consortium for Virtual Worlds (FCVW) Conference.

Established by the Information Resources Management College (iCollege) of the National Defense University in July 2007, the consortium was created to explore multi-agency and intra-agency collaboration using the robust capabilities of virtual worlds. Keep reading →

 /  Published May 15, 2012 at 2:35 PM

Smokey Bear Is Back

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The Forest Service is among several federal agencies making the most of mobile technology. As part of its “Only You Can Prevent Wildfires” campaign, the agency has integrated PSA videos, social media and a Smokey Bear app to teach youngsters (and their older counterparts) to pay attention when burning outdoors, whether that involves campfires or the errant cigarette. Among the features of the app are a step-by-step guide to building and extinguishing campfires as well as an interactive map of current wildfires across the country.

A related application is fire prediction software for mobile devices. This software, according to the Forest Service, can help manage forest fires and wild fires by putting data into a device that can help show where the fire may go next. While cautioning that firefighters shouldn’t rely solely on the devices, the Forest Service says the software can be a useful tool in the field. Keep reading →

 /  Published May 14, 2012 at 1:29 PM

Rise Of Big Data Issues Spurs Industry Commission

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The explosive growth of data emerging from social media, mobile applications and other sources is creating new challenges in terms of how to harness and obtain value from it.


The federal government’s recently announced $200 Million Big Data Research and Development Initiative is prompting new and higher profile attention from industry on how to better address the explosion of big data.

The latest example is the decision by TechAmerica Foundation, announced late last week, to create an expert commission on the big data issues.

“Big Data is one of the biggest issues that the technology industry has to tackle in the near term and we want to bring together the leading thinkers on the issue to provide the path forward,” said Jennifer Kerber, President of the TechAmerica Foundation.

Kerber cited the fact that more than 90% of the data that has ever existed was created in the past two years, according to a report in Fortune Magazine. Yet, the notion of what actually constitutes big data from the ongoing flood of information, and what new opportunities are emerging around big data, remains vague and not well understood, she said.

With the world’s data doubling every 18 months, the real question is how to make intelligent decisions based on that data, and that’s a question that is critical for government and industry to answer, she said.

The government of course has been dealing with big data issues for many years and has a variety of major initiatives already underway.

But the explosive growth of data emerging from social media, mobile applications, machine sensors and other sources is creating new challenges in terms of how to harness and obtain value from it.

Kerber said the new commission will seek to explore what capabilities are required to succeed with big data; how to use big data to make intelligent decisions; how will agencies effectively govern and secure huge volumes of information, while protecting privacy and civil liberties; and what value will it really deliver to the U.S. Government and U.S. citizens.

The TechAmerica Foundation said it is currently accepting applications for commissioners.

 /  Published May 7, 2012 at 11:17 AM

Governments Narrow The Digital Service Gap

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Citizens in seven leading countries suggest that the gap between government and the private sector is narrowing when it comes to delivering services electronically, according to a newly-released study.

Though the research reaffirms that governments have more work to do-and that some nations, such as Singapore, are much farther along than others in serving citizens electronically-the study’s findings also suggest that governments have come farther in their game of catch up with the private sector than many observers have suspected. Keep reading →

 /  Published May 4, 2012 at 1:49 PM

Kundra: Social Enterprises Are Defining Future Organizations

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Former Federal CIO Vivek Kundra, speaking in his new role as an executive for Salesforce.com, told the IT community today that powerful social networking applications are helping organizations interact with employees and customers in new dimensions, spurring a worldwide social enterprise revolution.

Kundra, who served as master of ceremonies for a two-hour presentation at a cloud computing event in Washington, D.C., showed an audience of about 2,000 gathered at the Washington Convention Center how leading corporations are incorporating applications that tap into a variety of social networking platforms to engage employees and customers. Keep reading →

 /  Published April 25, 2012 at 3:00 PM

Does Email Help or Hinder Your Professional Productivity?

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Email in the workplace is credited for both increasing productivity — and hindering it. Most of us groan about hours and hours of answering email, and analysis shows that most communication that happens via email is unproductive. In 2010, organizations lost about $1,250 per user a year in productivity due to spam, and up to $4,100 per year due to emails which were written poorly.

However, as the Economic Development Administration recently discovered, it is not so easy to get by without email either. A computer virus took out the agency’s entire computer network for a total of 81 days, forcing employees to rely on fax and ‘snail mail’ for paper communications. Though workers at the agency found ways around the lack of email, they did find it challenging. Keep reading →

 /  Published April 24, 2012 at 12:09 PM

FedSMC: Is Governing ‘Beyond The Desktop’ All Good?

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A conversation about how technology allows leaders to “govern beyond the desktop” generated optimism and laughter as well as fear and skepticism Tuesday at the annual Federal Senior Management Conference in Cambridge, Maryland.

“People are dating online. Meeting people all over the world,” said Anthony Macri, who serves on the General Services Administration’s mobility transformation team. “You have to shift to a virtual mentality and the technology supports that. It’s a mindset of virtual connectivity.” Keep reading →

 /  Published April 17, 2012 at 2:00 PM
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