eServices Office Managing Ubiquitous Content On the Web: Today and in the Future – (State ISO Meeting, July 10, 2008)

First: Intro to the eServices Office The eServices Office plays a key role in the development of eGovernment solutions for the State of California. The eServices Office coordinates with State agencies, departments, boards, and commissions to develop web sites and applications. The office also works with State agencies to identify services that when web-enabled, can provide maximum benefit to agencies and their customers.

Who We Have Been Working With… Executive: State CIO, DTS Director, Director of eServices Cross-Agency Groups: Webmasters User Group, Public Information Officers, IOUCA (can we add Information Security Officers?) Additionally we regularly communicate and visit many of the different agencies to assist them with their individual needs

Back to the Main Presentation Managing Ubiquitous Content On the Web: Today and in the Future

Definition: Ubiquitous “existing or being everywhere, esp. at the same time” Traditional thinking: “we publish a website” Reality: “our content is published all over the Web” And this has become the expectation

“Ubiquitous Today” What does this mean? “Web 2.0?, YouTube?, MySpace?, RSS?, Blogs? Mashups?” All the above, and more…? In a “nutshell”, what it means to us is: “Our websites” must be the “trusted” source of the truth and… We need a “process” (not a silver bullet) to insure that all this “ubiquitous” stuff: Always links/references back to the truth (our websites) Complies with law and doesn’t get us sued Does not violate privacy Is secure and accessible Is actively and continuously managed (while it constantly changes on us!)

Ubiquitous: Today 1. Search by: browsers, smart phones, voice, & maps For years now, they (Google, Yahoo, etc.) have charged nothing for it They collect usage stats (including IP) They present content about us with other non-government content on the same page They display money-making advertising also next to our content in their search results Nothing new, …but they have always done it without our formal permission… so it was OK, right?

Ubiquitous: Today – What’s the Issue? 1. Search: sometimes we have “agreements” with search vendors We have full control over what is allowed in the search results Examples: http://usasearch.gov/ (Microsoft & Vivismo – outsourced) http://search.ca.gov/ (Google Appliance at DTS) http://www.consumer-sc.ca.gov/ (Google Custom Search Engine – outsourced & free – but “who” signed the “agreement”?)

Ubiquitous: Today - Other “Agreements” 2. Social Networks (YouTube, MySpace, Facebook, Second Life, etc.) Utilizing these services makes our content very “findable” to the public, but we can’t fully control what content is presented along with our content Additionally: we can use their infrastructure to play videos on our own websites saving us lots of money – Ex: http://webtools.ca.gov/Multimedia/Video_Services.asp YouTube Examples: http://youtube.com/CaliforniaGovernment http://youtube.com/user/CaliforniaDMV Question: In the future, will field offices extend into MySpace & Second Life via the “Open Social APIs” being offered today ?

Ubiquitous: Today - Other “Agreements” 3. RSS & Map Services (Feedburner, Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, and many others can “subscribe” to and re-publish our information) Anyone can present our content next to non-government content – on any website Additionally: we can subscribe to this same content and re-publish it in different contexts on our own websites – Ex: http://webtools.ca.gov/Multimedia/Feeds.asp http://webtools.ca.gov/Multimedia/Maps.asp Important: this happens without “agreements” also!

Ubiquitous: Today - Other “Agreements” 4. Blogs, Wikis, & Forums (Wordpress, Blogger, Wikidot, FreeForums.org and many others) The issues here are more “cultural/management” than technical Examples: http://healtheillinois.wordpress.com/ (Cross-government partnership blog) http://blog.library.ca.gov/ (CA State Library blog) http://ldp-bookofwisdom.wikidot.com/ (NASA’s Leadership Development Program)

Ubiquitous: Today - Other “Social-Stuff” 5. Social Bookmarking (Del.icio.us, Digg, AddThis, etc.) Anyone can quickly present “links” on the Web to our content next to non-government content, and make any comment (good, bad, or ugly) about it With AddThis.com we can encourage them to do this by making it really easy – so content becomes more visible Examples: http://www.usa.gov (bookmarking button on the right) http://www.ca.gov (button on the left, and top on subsequent pages) http://del.icio.us/csllaw (CA State Law Library links – with RSS feed)

Ubiquitous: Today - Other “Stuff” 6. Gadgets, Widgets, Pipes & Analytics (Google, SpringWidgets, Microsoft, Yahoo, etc.) You can embed them into your own website, others use them to embed your content into their websites – usually without any “agreement” requirement Examples: http://www.ca.gov/weather_map.html (see the weather via a map) http://www.myspace/army (see SpringWidgets photo and RSS widgets on the lower right) http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/search?q=government&x=10&y=5 (Yahoo Pipes – combine content from multiple websites into a new presentation output: lists, maps, images – typical programming not needed) http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/pipe.info?_id=hCaQKTUu3BGkE3cPouNLYQ (this month’s vulnerabilities from: UK gov, Microsoft, securityfocus.com)

? Ubiquitous: Important Questions ? If we “go there” or not – our content will still be “out there” So “who” is going to put it out there? And… If we choose to not do it ourselves, are we comfortable with: Someone else doing it for us? Someone else representing/misrepresenting us? We can’t publish everywhere, but if we neglect the major places the public is going – how easy will it be for someone to “steal our identity” there?

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_3 Ubiquitous: Future Web 2.0 + ? = Web 3.0 See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_3 Many opinions… Will we be able to avoid Web 3.0? So what’s the “process” for getting there safely? (Gov 1.0  Gov 2.0  Gov 3.0)

eServices Office  State ISOs What’s the best way for us to work with you?