openNASA

Recently NYC’s Chief Digital Officer Rachel Sterne wrote an article about why cities (but really any level of government) should embrace the code-a-thon. We couldn’t agree more, so we wanted to post her list (slightly modified to include all government, not just NYC) on open.NASA and take this opportunity to encourage you to let you know about two upcoming NASA sponsored / supported code-a-thon events:

• Waterhackathon, Fall 2011, http://www.waterhackathon.org/
• Random Hacks of Kindness, December 3-4, 2011,http://www.rhok.org

Additionally, we hear that another Science Hack Day is currently being planned for November 12-13th in San Francisco!

Original article: http://mashable.com/2011/07/22/nyc-hackathon/

Rachel Sterne is Chief Digital Officer for theCity of New York, where she focuses on the City’sdigital media strategy. You can follow her on Twitter@RachelSterneor follow the City@nycgov.

1. It will bridge sectors and connect the government and technology communities around a shared challenge.
2. It will encourage collaborative problem-solving and a more open government.
3. It will create a mechanism for the public to share feedback and ideas.
4. It can serve as a model for other governments, helping to affect national and international change.
5. It will introduce creative and innovative concepts that could help to evolve government to be more efficient and effective in serving and empowering citizens.
6. It will provide both individuals and teams with face-to-face access to governments decision makers.
7. It creates a precedent and platform for evolving government through open innovation and participation.
8. It will serve as the first step in a transparent design process.
9. It helps remove subjectivity from the design process by clearly showing what the public wants and needs.
10. It equips developers with the internal data they need to make user experience decisions.