How I Made a 1,474-Megapixel Photo During President Obama’s Inaugural Address | David Bergman -- ALL ACCESS -- sports, concert, and music photographer
http://www.davidbergman.net/blog/2009/01/22/how-i-made-a-1474-megapixel-photo-during-president-obamas-inaugural-address/

Huge pano of Obama's inauguration

"My final photo is made up of 220 Canon G10 images and the file is 59,783 X 24,658 pixels or 1,474 megapixels. It took more than six and a half hours for the Gigapan software to put together all of the images on my Macbook Pro and the completed TIF file is almost 2 gigabytes." I think the photography aspect is more interesting than the Obama aspect. The level of zoomable detail is amazing!

"The team members, accustomed to working on Macintoshes, found computers outfitted with six-year-old versions of Microsoft software. Laptops were scarce, assigned to only a few people in the West Wing. The team was left struggling to put closed captions on online videos."

"It is kind of like going from an Xbox to an Atari" And the geeks shall inherit the Earth.

En arrivant à la Maison Blanche, l'équipe Obama, qui a mené la campagne la plus "2.0" de l'Histoire a découvert l'horreur d'une institution qui est resté à l'âge de pierre...

This is absolutely the reason the internet was invented.

Yes, only in Japan does Barack Obama fight Darth Vadar with a light saber

joanne

obama vs. darth vader

Must get interview

Jon Favreau

ジョン・ファブローとオバマの間でどのようなやりとりがあったか。

Guardian profile of Jon Favreau, head speechwriter for President Barack Obama.

eine art meta-"making of" mitsamt vorstellung eines engen mitarbeiter von barack obama

READ THE ARTICLE READ THE ARTICLE

Hi Res picture from above

Worldwide shots capture reaction to the inauguration of Barack Obama

amazing. can't believe i was there.

capas de obama

Great site keeping tabs on Obama's campaign promises.

via waxy

"PolitiFact has compiled about 500 promises that Barack Obama made during the campaign and is tracking their progress on our Obameter. We rate their status as No Action, In the Works or Stalled. Once we find action is completed, we rate them Promise Kept, Compromise or Promise Broken."

Yes, the Whitehouse now has a blog.

Yes, the White House has a blog. It started up the day of the inauguration.

The official blog from the White House.

"Select a scene:" の一番下。Photosynthの技術があの瞬間を切り取って、その雰囲気を集めてる。

就任式をphotosynthで

Photosynth

After a historic campaign season and Election Day, Barack Obama begins his term in the White House with a record-breaking inauguration.

great use of photosynth to show multidimensionality of Obama's election. one browses from one household to the other.... great stuff!!!

Amazing panorama of the U.S. president giving his inauguration speech (try viewing full-screen on a 30" monitor!)

site du washington post sur l'administration obama (participatif)

Awesome site provided by the Washington Post that provides in-depth information on many of Washington's inside elite.

WhoRunsGov.com offers a unique look at the world of Washington through its key players and personalities.

Washington Post experiment

amazing viz

"At noon EST, Barack H. Obama became the 44th president of the United States of America. Watch as the (Twitter) world watched. Below are the tweets worldwide that included inauguration with a "positive attitude." " - Flowing Data

Absolutely Brilliant. Transparency in Government will take back our country.

Herramientas que pone el estado Americano para contactar con la administración Publica

** Posted using Viigo: Mobile RSS, Sports, Current Events and more **

วิธีดู งานสาบานตนของ Obama

59,783 X 224,658 photo by David Bergman

Obama Inauguration. Awesome.

Amazing ultra high resolution picture of Obama's inauguration: you can see the entire crowd and zoom in on each person in amazing detail. Powerful...and scary

Text of President Barack Obama's inaugural address on Tuesday, as delivered.

de Bush a Obama xd

The resemblance between Bush and Obama is uncanny... The middle picture, which is coincidentally the average between the two, happens to be the best-looking IMO.

George W. Bush -> Barack H. Obama

Funny Sheeit

Sarah Palin Charges: If you want to know why the rest of the world is scared of Americans, consider the fact that after two terms of disastrous rule by a small-minded ignoramus, 46% of us apparently thought the problem was that he wasn’t quite stupid enough. Palin’s unending emissions of baffling, evasive incoherence should have disqualified her for any position that involved a desk, let alone placing her one erratic heartbeat from the presidency. The press strained mightily to feign respect for her, praising a debate performance that involved no debate, calling her a “great speaker” when her only speech was primarily a litany of insults to city-dwellers, echoing bogus sexism charges when a male Palin would have been boiled alive for the Couric interview alone, and lionizing her as she used her baby as a Pro-life stage prop before crowds who cooed when they should have been hurling polonium-tipped javelins. In the end, Palin had the beneficial effect of splitting her party betwe...

wow! is this the first wave of barack obama criticism? note: i don't know who 3/5ths of the people on this list are, but for everyone else, this tells it like it is. some very choice words.

web 2.0 and collaborative communication

Techcrunch

open-source democracy.

Obama nutzt die Onlinedienste von Google, Facebook etc auch als Präsident. Spannende Entwicklung, neben der bejahenden Tech-Sicht fehlt noch die kritischere Hinterfragung.

An absolutely amazing high definition panoramic image of the inauguration. Try zooming in. Wow.

Politico44 is a new and innovative way to cover the Obama presidency, minute-by-minute. Powered by the largest White House staff around, it will be the go-to place for news and analysis about the president, the staff, the first lady, the vice president, and the new administration.

Very cool site that gives you details about what Obama is doing and who he meets every day.

President-elect Obama has made a clear commitment to changing the way government relates to the People. His campaign was a demonstration of the value in such change, and a glimpse of its potential. His transition team has now taken a crucial step in making the work of the transition legally shareable, demonstrating that the values Obama spoke of are values that will guide his administration. To further support this commitment to change, and to help make it tangible, we offer three “open transition principles” to guide the transition in its use of the Internet to produce the very best in open government.

President-elect Obama has made a very clear commitment to changing the way government works with its citizens. To this end, we offer these three principles to guide the transition in its objective to build upon the very best of the Internet to produce the very best for government.

Thoughts on how to make the transition between presidential administrations as open and transparent as possible.

President-elect Obama has made a very clear commitment to changing the way government works with its citizens.

http://open-government.us/

TOO.FUNNY.

natural portraits a true individual destined for greatness....really nice to see these...

Obama : The College Years - nice hat

4 mr.hoffer students ONLY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! this is obama's speech in words & in video!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! d:-P

The text of Obama's inaugural speech

Everyone knows how well Barack Obama's presidential campaign made use of new media to raise money and market the candidate. We also know how big a role social ...

thought you might be interested in this

The centerpiece of President Obama's domestic agenda is an $819 billion economic stimulus plan. The Senate will consider the measure this week, with an eye toward the amount of tax cuts and spending. Republicans and Democrats spar over what to consider a tax cut. An analysis by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office tallies the tax-cut portion to be significantly less than the one-third Democrats claim it to be.

The Washington Post's breakdown of the stimulus package.

not the clearest visualization. could benefit from some compactness, perhaps via mouse interaction/exploration. but definitely a lot of good research and data in here.

obama's fc plan

obama plan website

A few weeks ago Obama's new secretary or treasury Tim Geitner unveiled the outlines of a plan to fix the financial crisis in our Country. One of the problems with these massive plans from the government is that citizens want to know exactly where their money is going. This is the treasury secretary's answer to that problem this site will document where all the money for the proposed plan will be documented and will be able to track.

Obama run site to track stimuls package spending

Republican Senators are questioning whether President Barack Obama’s stimulus bill contains the right mix of tax breaks and cash infusions to jump-start the economy. Tragically, no one from either party is objecting to the health provisions slipped in without discussion. These provisions reflect the handiwork of Tom Daschle, until recently the nominee to head the Health and Human Services Department. Senators should read these provisions and vote against them because they are dangerous to your health. (Page numbers refer to H.R. 1 EH, pdf version).

A lot of this is twisted but she's wrong about the position being new - Bush created it in 2004 from HHS.Gov - In 2004, the President issued an Executive Order establishing the position of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology within the Office of the Secretary of HHS. The primary purpose of this position is to aid the Secretary of HHS in achieving the President’s Goal for most Americans to have access to an interoperable electronic medical record by 2014.

Based on Tom Daschle's desire to emulate failed European health care market models, the porkulus plan has provisions to create a government run health information system which will track individual health records and recommend treatments. Daschle said we have to expect less health care as we get older because you're old and you're going to die soon anyway. Still the liberal elites will always be able to opt out of this system just like members of Congress don't pay into Social Security. The health part of this bill is all about getting more people under government run care in order to create dependence on politicians and bureaucrats. The only way to get as many people as possible under a government system is to ration.

Who in the world thinks this woman has any credibility criticizing health care plans after 1993?

Eye-opening glimpse of dealing w healthcare costs; suggests treating HC as a growth industry vs. cost drain but gives no guidance

describing the nationalizing of healthcare in the stimulus plan

The full text of Barack Obama's speech on his inauguration as US president.

Imagine if the White House was run democratically where everything was voted on by the public. Well, this site tries to simulate just that.

An interesting exercise in the effect of Digg and Democracy

Make your own Inauguration Speech. Is it too easy?

In case you fancy writing your own inauguration speech...!

Inaugural Days Events

Obama, Biden, both Clintons, both Bushes, Cheney, Palin, Gore, Carter, Pelosi, Huckabee, McCain, Giuliani and Blagojevich (plus a few more in linked updates...)

اگر به جای عکسی مستطیل قرمز دیدید لطف مخابرات را جبران کنید

From this entry I get information about how much more Obama used the Social Networking cites online than McCain and how that helped him.

deep

A little late, but wonderful nonetheless.

Preparations for the inauguration ceremony tomorrow for the 44th President of the United States of America have been taking place for months now. Security, transportation, logistics, sanitation, everything you can think of to accomodate the predicted millions of attendees.

great pictures

This half-meter resolution image of the United States Capitol, Washington D.C. was collected by the GeoEye-1 satellite on Jan. 20, 2009 to commemorate the Inauguration of President Barack Obama. The image, taken through high, wispy white clouds, shows the masses of people attending the Inaugural Celebration. (click to download)

Obama experience, paso a paso

How did I not link to this before?

he reads a book and swears. great

What Obama should really say to his opponents; mp3 clips from his book; impersonations; slang dialogue; Obama's range of intonations and personae

dang, obama cussing!!

In his bestselling autobiography, Dreams From My Father, President Obama introduces us to his high school friend, “Ray,” who, like him, is bi-racial. Who, also like him, is casting about to find his place in the world. But, who, unlike him, has a potty mouth that would make a sailor blush. Best of all? When reading the audiobook version of his bio, Obama does impressions of Ray’s manner of speech. Swear words and all. It’s fucking awesome. And it’s a way of talking we probably won’t be hearing from him now that he’s POTUS.

goodness, this could be fun for new ringtones. (I'm sure everyone in my office is sick of The Avalanches by now.)

The President is holding a new kind of online town hall where he will answer the questions you submitted and voted on for him. The event begins here at 11:30am ET. You can read the most popular questions submitted on the economy below.

WhiteHouse.gov is the official web site for the White House and President Barack Obama, the 44th President of the United States. This site is a source for information about the President, White House news and policies, White House history, and the federal government.

How Chris Hughes, 25, Helped Launch Facebook and the Barack Obama Campaign http://is.gd/nQZW [from http://twitter.com/suPEARLative5/statuses/1443010417]

Great article on building and working with online communities

Interesting

The Predator State: How Conservatives Abandoned the Free Market and Why Liberals Should Too. Annotated link http://www.diigo.com/bookmark/http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonmonthly.com%2Ffeatures%2F2009%2F0903.galbraith.html

"Why the economic crisis, and its solution, are bigger than you think."

We had hoped this would go differently.

April 7th, 2009 Friday evening, in a motion to dismiss Jewel v. NSA, EFF's litigation against the National Security Agency for the warrantless wiretapping of countless Americans, the Obama Administration's made two deeply troubling arguments.

Beeindruckende Fotos aus dem Weißen Haus in Washington. Soviel Präsenz und Offenheit und Unverkrampfheit würde unserer Regierung auch mal gut zu Gesicht stehen!

The White House is on Flickr with great photos.

Joe Biden created the group "I Love ‘I Love You, Man,' Man.".

News organizations have done an admirable job of recapping the first 100 days of the Obama administration. But rarely do we stumble across a primary source like Barack Obama's own Facebook feed. Scroll down for the full story.

Barack Obama Sent Somali Pirates a Trio of Snipers

Ha ha ha ha ha!

Karina Pallagst, director of the Shrinking Cities in a Global Perspective programme at the University of California, Berkeley, said there was "both a cultural and political taboo" about admitting decline in America.

Dozens of US cities may have entire neighbourhoods bulldozed as part of drastic "shrink to survive" proposals being considered by the Obama administration to tackle economic decline.

"In Detroit, shattered by the woes of the US car industry, there are already plans to split it into a collection of small urban centres separated from each other by countryside. 'The real question is not whether these cities shrink – we're all shrinking – but whether we let it happen in a destructive or sustainable way. Decline is a fact of life in Flint. Resisting it is like resisting gravity.'"

"The government looking at expanding a pioneering scheme in Flint, one of the poorest US cities, which involves razing entire districts and returning the land to nature. Local politicians believe the city must contract by as much as 40 per cent, concentrating the dwindling population and local services into a more viable area."

top

"i am a very famous minor television personality" ..heh. "live long and prosper"

Hodgman questions Obama's nerd credentials

lol

“Andrew, I watch you at these debates with no notes, no papers, and yet when asked questions, you spout off facts, figures, and policies, and I’m amazed. But then I look out into the audience and I ask myself, Does any of this really matter?”

creepy quote: "More than once in my travels in Alaska, people brought up, without prompting, the question of Palin’s extravagant self-regard. Several told me, independently of one another, that they had consulted the definition of “narcissistic personality disorder” in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders—“a pervasive pattern of grandiosity (in fantasy or behavior), need for admiration, and lack of empathy”—and thought it fit her perfectly. When Trig was born, Palin wrote an e-mail letter to friends and relatives, describing the belated news of her pregnancy and detailing Trig’s condition; she wrote the e-mail not in her own name but in God’s, and signed it ‘Trig’s Creator, Your Heavenly Father.’"

U.S. President Barack Obama has now been in office for 167 days, and it's time for a look back. Why 167 days? Why not - it's just as arbitrary a number as the usual "100 days". In that time, President Obama has contended with stimulating the U.S. economy, reshaping U.S. policy abroad, and starting work on domestic issues such as health care reform. As he and his family arrive in Moscow today for an official visit, find here a look back at some of the first 167 days of the Obama administration. (38 photos total)

<tweet> [t] <cnn> Watch it LIVE now: The Hearing on Sonia Sotomayor’s historical nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court http://www.cnn.com/live/ #sotomayor

<tweet> [t] <cnn> Obama discusses the economy and global warming at the G8 Summit LIVE now http://cnn.com/live

Watch @ryanblock live now on CNN http://www.cnn.com/live/ [from http://twitter.com/peterto/statuses/2541656580]

CNN.com Live is THE destination for live streaming video of breaking news and the latest information on unfolding events, with anchored coverage of top news stories throughout the day. Watch live video streams with the most current updates on national and international news, as well as the economy, politics, health, sports, weather, entertainment, business and much more. CNN.com Live takes you behind-the-scenes with celebrity interviews, brings you into the court room for exciting trials, and delivers live video feeds from major events like economic stimulus debates and decisions and the State of the Nation with John King at 12pm ET, including President Barack Obama's Address.

The Barack Obama Strategy

この事件、成り行きをどうなるのか、たぶん解決は無理と思っていた人がほとんどだったと思う。 もちろん解決することはできない深い問題だけれど、まぁ、叫び罵りあわずに、ビールでも飲んで話そうよ、ということを提案したことで、議論がとたんにポジティブになった

１、行動が迅速 ２、直接に話をし、徹底的に説明する ３、自分の悪かった点についての反省 ４、ネガティブな事件をポジティブなことに変える ５、まぁ、飲んで話そうよ、という落とし所

For the birther/townhaller crowd: http://www.whitehouse.gov/realitycheck/ [from http://twitter.com/foolsby/statuses/3267512826]

WhiteHouse.gov is the official web site for the White House and President Barack Obama, the 44th President of the United States. This site is a source for information about the President, White House news and policies, White House history, and the federal government.

this is homebase, but they are using their social media channels to drive people back to homebase.

With a projected $1.8 trillion deficit for 2009, several trillions more in deficits projected over the next decade, and with both Medicare and Social Security entitlement spending about to ratchet up several notches over the next 15 years as Baby Boomers become eligible for both, we are rapidly running out of other people's money. These deficits are simply not sustainable.

Testify brother, I think only business owners truly understand the ideas of free markets.

Here's what the CEO of Whole Foods actually said.

President Obama reportedly gave an iPod, loaded with 40 show tunes, to England's Queen Elizabeth II as a gift. Did he violate the law when he did so? You know your copyright laws are broken when there is no easy answer to this question.

President Obama reportedly gave an iPod, loaded with 40 show tunes, to England's Queen Elizabeth II as a gift. Did he violate the law when he did so?

iPods, First Sale, President Obama, and the Queen of England | Electronic Frontier Foundation

RT @nitot: Obama a acheté de la musique et donné un iPod à la reine d'angleterre. C'est un pirate ! http://tinyurl.com/cob9jm [from http://twitter.com/hvaudaux/statuses/1444222097]

Obama's "hip" gift to the Queen raises some interesting questions and points to a need for more discussion on the topic of what's really copyright infringement.

President Obama reportedly gave an iPod, loaded with 40 show tunes, to England's Queen Elizabeth II as a gift. Did he violate the law when he did so? You know your copyright laws are broken when there is no easy answer to this question.

getting me excited about data

Graphs of the impact of Obama on people/demographics in less than 1 year since inauguration.

Reading: Why Aneesh Chopra is a Great Choice for Federal CTO [feedly] http://tinyurl.com/c9vq5q [from http://twitter.com/br524/statuses/1565453164]

@timoreilly makes an excellent case for "Why Aneesh Chopra is a Great Choice for Federal CTO": http://bit.ly/15t7t [from http://twitter.com/dhinchcliffe/statuses/1554514397]

"The news has now been leaked that President Obama intends to nominate Aneesh Chopra as the nation's first Chief Technology Officer."

"So a streak that has always been there in the American right's world-view – to deny reality, and argue against a demonic phantasm of their own creation – has swollen. Now it is all they can see."

"How do they train themselves to be so impervious to reality?"

These aren't fringe phenomena: a Research 200 poll found that a majority of Republicans and Southerners say Obama wasn't born in the US, or aren't sure. A steady steam of Republican congressmen have been jabbering that Obama has "questions to answer". No amount of hard evidence – here's his birth certificate, here's a picture of his mother heavily pregnant in Hawaii, here's the announcement of his birth in the local Hawaiian paper – can pierce this conviction.

Sounds like whoever drafted the bill had just finished watching Die Hard 4.

Critics question revised proposal from Sen. Jay Rockefeller to let the White House do what it deems necessary to respond to a 'cybersecurity emergency.' Read this blog post by Declan McCullagh on Politics and Law.

The new version would allow the president to "declare a cybersecurity emergency" relating to "non-governmental" computer networks and do what's necessary to respond to the threat. Other sections of the proposal include a federal certification program for "cybersecurity professionals," and a requirement that certain computer systems and networks in the private sector be managed by people who have been awarded that license.

When Rockefeller (D-W. Virginia), the chairman of the Senate Commerce committee, and Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) introduced the original bill in April, they claimed it was vital to protect national cybersecurity. "We must protect our critical infrastructure at all costs--from our water to our electricity, to banking, traffic lights and electronic health records," Rockefeller said. The Rockefeller proposal plays out against a broader concern in Washington, D.C., about the government's role in cybersecurity. In May, President Obama acknowledged that the government is "not as prepared" as it should be to respond to disruptions and announced that a new cybersecurity coordinator position would be created inside the White House staff. Three months later, that post remains empty, one top cybersecurity aide has quit, and some wags have begun to wonder why a government that receives failing marks on cybersecurity should be trusted to instruct the private sector what to do.

The USA as the most interesting tech startup of '09, Anil Dash style.

was at 16 min in video... really interesting interview from US gov CIO/Wired

Ireland needs to reward govt APIs.

I think the most promising new startup of 2009 is one of the least likely: The executive branch of the federal government of the United States.

Each site has remarkably consistent branding elements, leading to a predictable and trustworthy sense of place when you visit the sites. There is clear attention to design, both from the cosmetic elements of these pages, and from the thoughtfulness of the information architecture on each site. (The clear, focused promotional areas on each homepage feel just like the "Sign up now!" links on the site of most Web 2.0 companies.) And increasingly, these services are being accompanied by new APIs and data sources that can be used by others to build interesting applications.

"Birthers, Health Care Hecklers and the Rise of Right-Wing Rage"

"Liberal power of all sorts induces an organic and crazy-making panic in a considerable number of Americans."

The quiver on the lips of the man pushing the wheelchair, the crazed risk of carrying a pistol around a president -- too heartfelt to be an act. The lockstep strangeness of the mad lies on the protesters' signs -- too uniform to be spontaneous. They are both.

Good thing our leaders weren't so cowardly in 1964, or we would never have passed a civil rights bill -- because of complaints over the provisions in it that would enslave whites.

a good article for class. talk about the two equal sides to every issue myth.

We'll never have affective healthcare in this country because crazy is a preexisting condition.

So the birthers, the anti-tax tea-partiers, the town hall hecklers -- these are "either" the genuine grass roots or evil conspirators staging scenes for YouTube? The quiver on the lips of the man pushing the wheelchair, the crazed risk of carrying a pistol around a president -- too heartfelt to be an act. The lockstep strangeness of the mad lies on the protesters' signs -- too uniform to be spontaneous. They are both. If you don't understand that any moment of genuine political change always produces both, you can't understand America, where the crazy tree blooms in every moment of liberal ascendancy, and where elites exploit the crazy for their own narrow interests.

actually a really good speech encouraging the kids to be proactive about their education. "Here in America, you write your own destiny. You make your own future."

Text of Barack Obama's Speech to America's Schoolchildren

Click here to go to the White House website to see the remarks the President will make to schoolchildren on Tuesday, Sept. 8th.

WhiteHouse.gov is the official web site for the White House and President Barack Obama, the 44th President of the United States. This site is a source for information about the President, White House news and policies, White House history, and the federal government.

health care

President Obama's health care speech delivered on September 9, 2009 compliments of Huffington Post.

A great speech

Full transcript and video of Obama's September 2009 healthcare speech.

s always open.

A lot of promises.

We are not here to fear the future, we are here to shape the future.

pay close attention to the breakdown of services; note the money, resources, and suffering

In the week that Britain's National Health Service was held aloft by Republicans as an "evil and Orwellian" example of everything that is wrong with free healthcare, these extraordinary scenes in Inglewood, California yesterday provided a sobering reminder of exactly why President Barack Obama is trying to reform the US system. The LA Forum, the arena that once hosted sell-out Madonna concerts, has been transformed – for eight days only – into a vast field hospital. In America, the offer of free healthcare is so rare, that news of the magical medical kingdom spread rapidly and long lines of prospective patients snaked around the venue for the chance of getting everyday treatments that many British people take for granted.

They came in their thousands, queuing through the night to secure one of the coveted wristbands offering entry into a strange parallel universe where medical care is a free and basic right and not an expensive luxury. Some of these Americans had walked miles simply to have their blood pressure checked, some had slept in their cars in the hope of getting an eye-test or a mammogram, others had brought their children for immunisations that could end up saving their life.

An extraordinary report from Guy Adams in Los Angeles at the music arena that has been turned into a makeshift medical centre

Wasn't going to post this b/c I try to avoid lame gossip/People Mag stuff, but the audio is so clear. Those little digital voice recorders are amazing.

Examples of open government in USA

USA initiatives in eGov and eP

In the Innovations Gallery, the public can browse examples of new ways in which agencies across the Executive branch are using transparency, participation, and collaboration to achieve their mission.

"The Innovations Gallery celebrates the innovators and innovations who are championing the President’s vision of more effective and open government."

The Innovations Gallery celebrates the innovators and innovations who are championing the President’s vision of more effective and open government. In the Innovations Gallery, the public can browse examples of new ways in which agencies across the Executive branch are using transparency, participation, and collaboration to achieve their mission.

EXAMPLES listed on WhiteHouse.gov

list of innovations by the White House that are open to participation

Übersicht der Gov Web Innovationen des White House

WhiteHouse.gov is the official web site for the White House and President Barack Obama, the 44th President of the United States. This site is a source for information about the President, White House news and policies, White House history, and the federal government.

weirdest thing ever

These paintings by Dan Lacey, also known as The Painter of Pancakes, shows his portrayal of the president of the United States in a series of unique paintings.

acid+paint+a Politico subscription + skittles

No matter what your particular political leanings are, I think we can all agree that this artist is definitely a weirdo. I also enjoy the fact that the person who posted these labeled them as "unusual paintings," as if there were normal, everyday paintings of a nude president cavorting with mythical beasts.

Gore attacks edmund again

A conversation with Gore Vidal unfolds at his pace.

to re-read

Interview from Guardian G2, Feb 2009. "People have been bamboozled with the technology for too long," he says. "The real questions are, 'What are your goals, and how can you use technology to achieve them?' "Organisations can build very quickly, if they do the messaging right. They need to be able to answer the question, 'What can someone do for me today?'

"People have been bamboozled with the technology for too long," he says. "The real questions are, 'What are your goals, and how can you use technology to achieve them?' Our biggest sales pitch is that we couple the services along with the technology. A lot of our competition just sells technology, and the types of organisation and causes that we like to work with, if I go in and sell them really powerful technology, it doesn't do them any good, because they don't have the wherewithal to make sense of it."

Newest addition to my fantasy dinner party guestlist: Thomas Gensemer. http://is.gd/jUmY [from http://twitter.com/louisedoherty/statuses/1226680797]

Thomas Gensemer Mastermind of the Democratic campaign

Fully $350 billion a year could be saved on paperwork alone if the U.S. went to a single-payer system — more than enough to pay for the whole goddamned thing, if anyone had the balls to stand up and say so.

This article is an opinion piece writton the criticisms and downfalls of the healthcare plan. It is an important site, because the health care reform policy promotes itself, so it is important the the public is exposed to both opinions and both sides of the health care reform system. The article stresses the critical state of America's healthcare system and expresses its need for reform. However, the piece stresses that Obama-Biden health care reform policy will only hurt the health care system further.

Matt Taibbi, right on as usual (and rightly pissed off)

RollingStone

A book representing the art & design from the campaign for change.

kommentar von o'reilly "Giving modifications back to the Drupal community is the next breakthrough announcement that I'll be looking for."

Yesterday, the new media team at the White House announced via the Associated Press that whitehouse.gov is now running on Drupal, the open source content management system. That Drupal implementation is in turn running on a Red Hat Linux system with Apache, MySQL and the rest of the LAMP stack. Apache Solr is the new White House search engine.

Statistical findings from a Pew survey, showing the percentage of internet users that used online sources to get information on the 2008 election. The survey shows how many users shared information through blogs, watched political videos online, shared political content online through e-mail, and used social networking sites to get involved.

This research summary from the Pew Internet & American Life Project provides some interesting insights into who used the Internet during the 2008 presidential campaign and how they used it. In short, the researchers note a significant jump in the number of people seeking information about candidates online rather than from radio or print, not to mention the level of engagement (two-sided interaction with the information) these users demanded. The most intriguing part of the research is perhaps unwritten: The shift in methods of civic engagement highlighted by this report points to the importance of studying--and more importantly teaching--new media/literacies.

This article is an overview of internet usage patterns in relation to the 2008 US Election campaign. It statistically analyses who went online to get involved in the political process.

Tutkimustuloksia Internetin roolista USA:n vaalikampanjassa. Mistä kansalaiset hakivat tietoa jne.

Polls can affect president's hold on party - USATODAY.com

The Gallup organization first started asking Americans how they approved of the job the president was doing in the 1940s. See how each president since then has fared in the approval poll, look at some news events that influenced public opinion and compare how approval ratings evolved for each president.

Presidential approval ratings over time

To enable the citizen masher to do their wizardry, the administration will be opening up a veritable candy store of goodies: Semantic Web, RDF, Linked Data, SPARQL, RDFa, SIOC, ATOM, RESTful APIs, JSON, Widgets, Wikis, XForms, P2P Networks. Wow. They only forgot the lions and tigers and bears oh my… This is an unbelievable stack of technology. I didn’t think the government even knew what an RSS feed was :)

Kerlikowske Says Analogy Is Counterproductive; Shift Aligns With Administration Preference for Treatment Over Incarceration

May article about the Obama administration's approach to drugs and the criminal justice system

WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration's new drug czar says he wants to banish the idea that the U.S. is fighting "a war on drugs," a move that would underscore a shift favoring treatment over incarceration in trying to reduce illicit drug use. In his first interview since being confirmed to head the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, Gil Kerlikowske said Wednesday the bellicose analogy was a barrier to dealing with the nation's drug issues. "Regardless of how you try to explain to people it's a 'war on drugs' or a 'war on a product,' people see a war as a war on them," he said. "We're not at war with people in this country."

@wsj - "White House Czar Calls for End to 'War on Drugs' - WSJ.com" http://hub.tm/?jmjSY [from http://twitter.com/carreonG/statuses/1794610123]

WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration's new drug czar says he wants to banish the idea that the U.S. is fighting "a war on drugs," a move that would underscore a shift favoring treatment over incarceration in trying to reduce illicit drug use. In his first interview since being confirmed to head the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, Gil Kerlikowske said Wednesday the bellicose analogy was a barrier to dealing with the nation's drug issues.

This Is Yer Brain On War

"Regardless of how you try to explain to people it's a 'war on drugs' or a 'war on a product,' people see a war as a war on them," he said. "We're not at war with people in this country."

The president has packed his economic team with Wall Street insiders intent on turning the bailout into an all-out giveaway. By Matt Taibbi

"What's taken place in the year since Obama won the presidency has turned out to be one of the most dramatic political about-faces in our history. Elected in the midst of a crushing economic crisis brought on by a decade of orgiastic deregulation and unchecked greed, Obama had a clear mandate to rein in Wall Street and remake the entire structure of the American economy. What he did instead was ship even his most marginally progressive campaign advisers off to various bureaucratic Siberias, while packing the key economic positions in his White House with the very people who caused the crisis in the first place. This new team of bubble-fattened ex-bankers and laissez-faire intellectuals then proceeded to sell us all out, instituting a massive, trickle-up bailout and systematically gutting regulatory reform from the inside."

The controversial Matt Taibbi December 2009 Rolling Stone article.

China knows it is becoming an uncontested superpower; indeed its newfound muscular confidence was on striking display in Copenhagen. Its coal-based economy doubles every decade, and its power increases commensurately. Its leadership will not alter this magic formula unless they absolutely have to

too pretty!

Thank you Maira Kalman http://tinyurl.com/ceabnu [from http://twitter.com/mintonmorris/statuses/1164471814]

"The angels are singing on this glorious day."

pretty pretty.

Video de la investidura de Barack Obama

Jurament i discurs del dia de la investidura de Barack Obama.

History Being Made..!

Obama's Inauguration Speech

Obama's 2009 inaugural address

Conservative protesters should remember that the recession, which led to so many of the policies they oppose, is almost entirely the result of Bush’s policies. According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, the recession began in December 2007—long before Obama was even nominated. And the previous recession ended in November 2001, so the current recession cannot be blamed on cyclical forces that Bush inherited.

HOORAY!

RT @applicants: The Obama Economy http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123604419092515347.html [from http://twitter.com/Captoe/statuses/1276487461]

WSJ edit page fires a shot across Obama's bow.

As the Dow keeps dropping, the President is running out of people to blame.

"Both major parties have become a rats' nest of hypocrisy and incompetence. That, combined with our stratospheric, near-criminal indebtedness to China (which could destroy the dollar overnight), should raise signal flags. Are we like late Rome, infatuated with past glories, ruled by a complacent, greedy elite, and hopelessly powerless to respond to changing conditions?"

Liberal writer Camille Paglia = intellectually honest.

A hard look at the problems with the current healthcare proposals, from the moderate liberal perspective.

Aug. 12, 2009 | Buyer's remorse? Not me. At the North American summit in Guadalajara this week, President Obama resumed the role he is best at -- representing the U.S. with dignity and authority abroad. This is why I, for one, voted for Obama and continue to support him. The damage done to U.S. prestige by the feckless, buffoonish George W. Bush will take years to repair. Obama has barely begun the crucial mission that he was elected to do.

Read Entire Package Here

Provides a high level breakdown of how much money is allocated to each agency

Stimulus Spending Breakouts

see very bottom for foreclosure information

WhiteHouse.gov is the official web site for the White House and President Barack Obama, the 44th President of the United States. This site is a source for information about the President, White House news and policies, White House history, and the federal government.

year

The White House Blog, January 21, 2009

America: In the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children's children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God's grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations. Thank you. God bless you. And

Scott Horton (Harper's Magazine)

1. “Asymmetrical Warfare”-- When President Barack Obama took office last year, he promised to “restore the standards of due process and the core constitutional values that have made this country great.” Toward that end, the president issued an executive order declaring that the extra-constitutional prison camp at Guantánamo Naval Base “shall be closed as soon as practicable, and no later than one year from the date of this order.” Obama has failed to fulfill his promise.

On June 9th, 2006, [Aamer] was beaten for two and a half hours straight. Seven naval military police participated in his beating. Mr. Aamer stated he had refused to provide a retina scan and fingerprints. He reported to me that he was strapped to a chair, fully restrained at the head, arms and legs. The MPs inflicted so much pain, Mr. Aamer said he thought he was going to die. The MPs pressed on pressure points all over his body: his temples, just under his jawline, in the hollow beneath his ears. They choked him. They bent his nose repeatedly so hard to the side he thought it would break. They pinched his thighs and feet constantly. They gouged his eyes. They held his eyes open and shined a mag-lite in them for minutes on end, generating intense heat. They bent his fingers until he screamed. When he screamed, they cut off his airway, then put a mask on him so he could not cry out.

A financial crisis is the worst time to change the foundations of American capitalism.

an insane article, on this day there were videos of tent camps in Sacramento, CA filled with people who had lost jobs. The editorial is by Michael Boskin

Description. You want to read about the code structure of the new whitehouse.gov website on this historic Inauguration Day of the 44th president of the USA. The site is built on ASP.NET.

"The whitehouse.gov has a page weight of 821 KB and loaded in 1.58 seconds on my cable modem. This is around average for new and graphically-oriented sites." Say what??

Interesting read about the use of technology in the Obama campaign. The link between my.barackobama.com and actual physical volunteering and organizing is particularly interesting.

"Everything I thought we knew about the campaign's use of technology and the Internet faded as I spent more time with the campaign. The game-changer in the Obama campaign, as I found in talking to key staff—and through volunteering in southern Ohio myself—was that technology was not an add-on: It represented a carefully considered element of almost every critical campaign function. Most remarkably, technology played a critical role in the one area least understood by the "digerati" and most online campaigners: moving online supporters toward real-world action. "

A smart post from Michael Silberman of echoditto

Rectangles in the chart are sized according to the amount of spending for that category. Color shows the change in spending from 2010.

President Obama's proposal for the 2011 budget.

Nice graphical representation of Obama's 2011 budget proposal, and how the budget changes from 2010.

Beautiful infographic.

A Strong Middle Class

US Government

Official blog of V.P. Joe Biden's Middle Class Task Force

This is the official web page of the White House Task Force on Middle Class Working Families.

WhiteHouse.gov is the official web site for the White House and President Barack Obama, the 44th President of the United States. This site is a source for information about the President, White House news and policies, White House history, and the federal government.

interesting

SUNDAY FEB. 22, 2009 07:36 EST Fox News "war games" the coming civil war (updated below) Bill Clinton's election in 1992 gave rise to the American "militia movement": hordes of overwhelmingly white, middle-aged men from suburban and rural areas who convinced themselves they were defending the American way of life from the "liberals" and "leftists" running the country by dressing up in military costumes on weekends, wobbling around together with guns, and play-acting the role of patriot-warriors. Those theater groups -- the cultural precursor to George Bush's prancing 2003 performance dressed in a fighter pilot outfit on Mission Accomplished Day -- spawned the decade of the so-called "Angry White Male," the movement behind the 1994 takeover of the U.S. Congress by Newt Gingrich and his band of federal-government-cursing, pseudo-revolutionary, play-acting tough guys.

"Bill Clinton's election in 1992 gave rise to the American "militia movement": hordes of overwhelmingly white, middle-aged men from suburban and rural areas who convinced themselves they were defending the American way of life from the "liberals" and "leftists" running the country by dressing up in military costumes on weekends, wobbling around together with guns, and play-acting the role of patriot-warriors...What was most remarkable about this allegedly "anti-government" movement was that -- with some isolated and principled exceptions -- it completely vanished upon the election of Republican George Bush, and it stayed invisible even as Bush presided over the most extreme and invasive expansion of federal government power in memory...But now, only four weeks into the presidency of Barack Obama, they are back -- angrier and more chest-beating than ever."

What was most remarkable about this allegedly "anti-government" movement was that -- with some isolated and principled exceptions -- it completely vanished upon the election of Republican George Bush, and it stayed invisible even as Bush presided over the most extreme and invasive expansion of federal government power in memory. Even as Bush seized and used all of the powers which that movement claimed in the 1990s to find so tyrannical and unconstitutional -- limitless, unchecked surveillance activities, detention powers with no oversight, expanding federal police powers, secret prison camps, even massively exploding and debt-financed domestic spending -- they meekly submitted to all of it, even enthusiastically cheered it all on.

Fox News "war games" the coming civil war

Whitehouse.gov Redesign: The Change Has Come

The Obama administration is now completely wedded to the idea that there’s nothing fundamentally wrong with the financial system — that what we’re facing is the equivalent of a run on an essentially sound bank.

The Obama administration is now completely wedded to the idea that there’s nothing fundamentally wrong with the financial system — that what we’re facing is the equivalent of a run on an essentially sound bank. As Tim Duy put it, there are no bad assets, only misunderstood assets. And if we get investors to understand that toxic waste is really, truly worth much more than anyone is willing to pay for it, all our problems will be solved.

We should just let the banks and institutions that have been poorly managed fail.

To this end the plan proposes to create funds in which private investors put in a small amount of their own money, and in return get large, non-recourse loans from the taxpayer, with which to buy bad — I mean misunderstood — assets. This is supposed to lead to fair prices because the funds will engage in competitive bidding. But it’s immediately obvious, if you think about it, that these funds will have skewed incentives. In effect, Treasury will be creating — deliberately! — the functional equivalent of Texas S&Ls in the 1980s: financial operations with very little capital but lots of government-guaranteed liabilities. For the private investors, this is an open invitation to play heads I win, tails the taxpayers lose. So sure, these investors will be ready to pay high prices for toxic waste. After all, the stuff might be worth something; and if it isn’t, that’s someone else’s problem.

Krugman talks about structural problems that make Geithner's plan highly unlikely to work, and msot definitely transfers all risk upon the tax payer http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/23/opinion/23krugman.html

Krugman analyzes The Geithner plan

In effect, Treasury will be creating — deliberately! — the functional equivalent of Texas S&Ls in the 1980s: financial operations with very little capital but lots of government-guaranteed liabilities. For the private investors, this is an open invitation to play heads I win, tails the taxpayers lose.

This plan will produce big gains for banks that didn’t actually need any help; it will, however, do little to reassure the public about banks that are seriously undercapitalized. And I fear that when the plan fails, as it almost surely will, the administration will have shot its bolt: it won’t be able to come back to Congress for a plan that might actually work.

The debates unnerved both candidates. When he was preparing for them during the Democratic primaries, Obama was recorded saying, "I don't consider this to be a good format for me, which makes me more cautious. I often find myself trapped by the questions and thinking to myself, 'You know, this is a stupid question, but let me … answer it.' So when Brian Williams is asking me about what's a personal thing that you've done [that's green], and I say, you know, 'Well, I planted a bunch of trees.' And he says, 'I'm talking about personal.' What I'm thinking in my head is, 'Well, the truth is, Brian, we can't solve global warming because I f---ing changed light bulbs in my house. It's because of something collective'."

Project Houdini

'Well, the truth is, Brian, we can't solve global warming because I f---ing changed light bulbs in my house. It's because of something collective'

More info on the Houdini project from the Obama campaign

The disclosures are among many revealed in "How He Did It, 2008," the latest installment in NEWSWEEK's Special Election Project, which was first published in 1984. As in the previous editions, "How He Did It, 2008" is an inside, behind-the-scenes account of the presidential election produced by a special team of reporters working for more than a year on an embargoed basis and detached from the weekly magazine and Newsweek.com. Everything the project team learns is kept confidential until the day after the polls close.

The Obama campaign was provided with reports from the Secret Service showing a sharp and disturbing increase in threats to Obama in September and early October, at the same time that many crowds at Palin rallies became more frenzied. Michelle Obama was shaken by the vituperative crowds and the hot rhetoric from the GOP candidates. "Why would they try to make people hate us?" Michelle asked a top campaign aide.

Vettu, jeg begynner å like han her: "The debates unnerved both candidates. When he was preparing for them during the Democratic primaries, Obama was recorded saying, "I don't consider this to be a good format for me, which makes me more cautious. I often find myself trapped by the questions and thinking to myself, 'You know, this is a stupid question, but let me … answer it.' So when Brian Williams is asking me about what's a personal thing that you've done [that's green], and I say, you know, 'Well, I planted a bunch of trees.' And he says, 'I'm talking about personal.' What I'm thinking in my head is, 'Well, the truth is, Brian, we can't solve global warming because I f---ing changed light bulbs in my house. It's because of something collective'."

this is good scary look at things and people hating obama hilary the CAMPAIGN

Homer Simpson tries to vote for Obama. Homer Simpson tries to vote for Obama in the '08 election.. From: deebold08. Views: 10239317. 29551 ratings. Time: 01:21. More in. Entertainment.

Homer Simpson tries to vote for Obama. Homer Simpson tries to vote for Obama in the '08 election.. From: deebold08. Views: 10223817. 29500 ratings. Time: 01:21. More in. Entertainment.

Genre: animation

lol often http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aBaX9GPSaQ

funny clip

Uff, buen video para responde mi pregunta por quien votaria Homero Simpson?

all the figures behind obama's social networks and their achievements

Article on Obama's strategy for raising money via online, tms, email, etc.

Fascinating article that traces election results in counties in the South all the way back to geological events millions of years ago. In short, coastlines determined soil types which determined demographics which determined voting patterns.

This is so awesome.

How an ancient Cretaceous shoreline voted for Obama.

amazing. how soil types determine voting patterns.

David Frum

I can only hope both sides can start to find more value in the middle. Both edges scare me.

A huge part of the blame for today’s disaster attaches to conservatives and Republicans ourselves. At the beginning of this process we made a strategic decision: unlike, say, Democrats in 2001 when President Bush proposed his first tax cut, we would make no deal with the administration. No negotiations, no compromise, nothing. We were going for all the marbles. This would be Obama’s Waterloo – just as healthcare was Clinton’s in 1994. Only, the hardliners overlooked a few key facts: Obama was elected with 53% of the vote, not Clinton’s 42%. The liberal block within the Democratic congressional caucus is bigger and stronger than it was in 1993-94. And of course the Democrats also remember their history, and also remember the consequences of their 1994 failure. This time, when we went for all the marbles, we ended with none.

but what is equally true – is that he also wants Republicans to fail. If Republicans succeed – if they govern successfully in office and negotiate attractive compromises out of office – Rush’s listeners get less angry. And if they are less angry, they listen to the radio less, and hear fewer ads for Sleepnumber beds.

See subsequent followup link...

"If Obama’s first legislative priority had been immigration or financial reform or climate change, we would have seen the same trajectory. The conjunction of a black president and a female speaker of the House — topped off by a wise Latina on the Supreme Court and a powerful gay Congressional committee chairman — would sow fears of disenfranchisement among a dwindling and threatened minority in the country no matter what policies were in play. It’s not happenstance that Frank, Lewis and Cleaver — none of them major Democratic players in the health care push — received a major share of last weekend’s abuse. When you hear demonstrators chant the slogan “Take our country back!,” these are the people they want to take the country back from."

Questions: of all the video and audio footage there, no footage? And also, really? They wanted to enjoy a spring day during a protest. Absolutely logical. Seems politicians never tire of the "Look there! A (racist, bigot, socialist, etc.)"

To find a prototype for the overheated reaction to the health care bill, you have to look a year before Medicare, to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Both laws passed by similar majorities in Congress; the Civil Rights Act received even more votes in the Senate (73) than Medicare (70). But it was only the civil rights bill that made some Americans run off the rails. That’s because it was the one that signaled an inexorable and immutable change in the very identity of America, not just its governance

An analysis of Obama's victory speech.

linked: A NEW AMERICA http://tinyurl.com/5wqy6t [from http://twitter.com/travispoling/statuses/991273776]

Beautiful. I really enjoyed it.

In 1980, when Obama was a freshman at Occidental College in Los Angeles, he was approached by an aspiring photographer named Lisa Jack, who asked him if he would be willing to pose for some black and white photographs that she could use in her portfolio.

The slide deck .. is by the talented Rahaf Harfoush - I share her passion for learning, developing, testing, and executing ideas, thinking in terms of possibility, and surrounding myself with interested people. Are these some of the essential qualities of a marketer 2.0? Plus Edelman Digital and Blue State Digital.

Under the Bush team a prominent and profitable bank, under threat of a damaging public audit, was forced to accept less than $1b of TARP money. The gov insisted on buying a new class of preferred stock which gave it a tiny, minority position. The money flowed to the bank. Arguably, back then, the Bush administration was acting for purely economic reasons. It wanted to recapitalize the banks to halt a financial panic. Fast forward to today, and that same bank is begging to give the money back. The chairman offers to write a check, now, with interest. He's been sitting on the cash for months and has felt the dead hand of government threatening to run his business and dictate pay scales. He sees the writing on the wall and he wants out. But the Obama team says no, since unlike the smaller banks that gave their TARP money back, this bank is far more prominent. The bank has also been threatened with "adverse" consequences if its chairman persists. That's politics talking, not economics.

I must be naive. I really thought the administration would welcome the return of bank bailout money. Some $340 million in TARP cash flowed back this week from four small banks in Louisiana, New York, Indiana and California. This isn't much when we routinely talk in trillions, but clearly that money has not been wasted or otherwise sunk down Wall Street's black hole. So why no cheering as the cash comes back?

How do racists, anti-Semites and all-purpose hate-mongers view the possibility of America’s first black president? Not necessarily the way you think they would.

WTF o_O

"In an informal Esquire survey, three out of four white supremacists prefer Obama, while McCain is the clear favorite among black nationalists. (Sure, our methodology suffered from an extraordinarily low sample size--limited to four white supremacists and one black nationalist--but just because it wouldn’t fly with Gallup doesn’t mean there ain't a kernel of truth in there.)"

interesting article

"White people are faced with either a negro or a total nutter who happens to have a pale face. Personally I’d prefer the negro.

Then, we have a black man, who loves his own kind, belongs to a Black-Nationalist religion, is married to a black women--when usually negroes who have 'made it' immediately land a white spouse as a kind of prize--that’s the kind of negro that I can respect. Any time that a prominent person embraces their racial heritage in a positive manner, it’s good for all racially minded folks

Probably one of the most ironic things in the history of irony.

Video - CNBC.com

Intense reaction by some financial analysts in Wallstreet to the current plans

Rick Santelli expresses outrage at the prospect of government rewarding bad behavior.

"CNBC's Rick Santelli and the traders on the floor of the CME Group express outrage. . ." It's good to see and hear people who are appropriately angry. Also, note the paternalistic, faux-aristocratic comments of the other anchors, though; particularly how they try to paint a dissenting, informed, concerned, and eloquent citizen as a demagogue stirring up, "mob rule."

Security concerns and record-keeping laws mean that Barack Obama is unlikely to become the first e-mailing president.

Obama may need to give up his BlackBerry to become president.

"For years, like legions of other professionals, Mr. Obama has been all but addicted to his BlackBerry. The device has rarely been far from his side — on most days, it was fastened to his belt — to provide a singular conduit to the outside world as the bubble around him grew tighter and tighter throughout his campaign."

Given how important it is for him to get unfiltered information from as many sources as possible, he will miss the freedom of email

One of the most interesting parts of running a large website is watching the effects of unrelated events affecting user traffic in aggregate. Web traffic is something that companies typically keep very secret, and often the only time engineers can talk about it is late at night, at a bar, and very much off the record. There are many good reasons for keeping this kind of information confidential, particularly for publicly traded companies with complicated disclosure requirements. There are also downsides, the biggest being that is difficult for peers to learn from each other and compare notes. John Allspaw recently created a WebOps Visualizations group on Flickr for sharing these kinds of graphs with the confidential information removed. Here’s an example of a traffic drop seen both by Flickr & by Last.FM that coincided with President Obama’s inauguration.

all stats and graphs are fantastic. Whatever they are for.

オバマ宣誓中のネット活動可視化。

Comparison of traffic at Flickr, Google, Twitter, last.fm during the Obama inauguration. "One of the most interesting parts of running a large website is watching the effects of unrelated events affecting user traffic in aggregate."

dataporn webtraffic

zahlenfutter und die verbildlichung davon. rund um die amtseinführung von barack obama

Probably the defining moment in Sen Obama's campaign ... meeting Jed Bartlet!

"The people who want English to be the official language of the United States are uncomfortable with their leaders being fluent in it."

Saw this all over the place during the campaign, loved it then, and finally found it online ^_^

The Sectéra® Edge™ smartphone converges secure wireless voice and data by combining the functionality of a wireless phone and PDA — all in one easy-to-use handheld device. Developed for the National Security Agency’s Secure Mobile Environment Portable Electronic Device (SME PED) program, the Sectéra Edge is certified to protect wireless voice communications classified Top Secret and below as well as access e-mail and websites classified Secret and below. The Sectéra Edge is the only SME PED that switches between an integrated classified and unclassified PDA with a single key press.

General Dynamics C4 Systems is a leading integrator of network-centric command, control, communication and computing solutions from space to ground - core to edge. The company’s focus is on engineering and integrating secure communication, information and technology solutions that facilitate the delivery of relevant information to speed the decision cycle, so our customers can see, hear, decide and act with absolute confidence - faster and more effectively.

Obama's new Blackberry - Sectera Edge by General Dynamics, the only smart phone NSA rated for Top Secret communications. http://is.gd/fZqn [from http://twitter.com/eighteyes/statuses/1139490924]

Obama's new NSA-approved phone

online marketing sty. by B.Obama

'It's kind of like going from an Xbox to an Atari,' an Obama aide says

If the Obama campaign represented a sleek, new iPhone kind of future, the first day of the Obama administration looked more like the rotary-dial past.

"If the Obama campaign represented a sleek, new iPhone kind of future, the first day of the Obama administration looked more like the rotary-dial past."

"Two years after launching the most technologically savvy presidential campaign in history, Obama officials ran smack into the constraints of the federal bureaucracy yesterday, encountering a jumble of disconnected phone lines, old computer software, and security regulations forbidding outside e-mail accounts." I guess at least they didn't remove all the Ws from the keyboards.

If the Obama campaign represented a sleek, new iPhone kind of future, the first day of the Obama administration looked more like the rotary-dial past. Two years after launching the most technologically savvy presidential campaign in history, Obama officials ran smack into the constraints of the federal bureaucracy yesterday, encountering a jumble of disconnected phone lines, old computer software, and security regulations forbidding outside e-mail accounts. What does that mean in 21st-century terms? No Facebook to communicate with supporters. No outside e-mail log-ins. No instant messaging. Hard adjustments for a staff that helped sweep Obama to power through, among other things, relentless online social networking. "It is kind of like going from an Xbox to an Atari," Obama spokesman Bill Burton said of his new digs.

Nice to see the White House is just like any other bloody office I've worked in then!

on this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord, on this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn-out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics

Obama speech. Use for Hopes and Dreams as well as writing to argue and persuade

Barack Obama has been sworn in as the 44th US president. Here is his inauguration speech in full.

The full text of Barack Obama's speech on his inauguration as US president.

The truth about Obama....

visualisiert Text in Baumdiagramm

obama word tree

interactive map to explore the speech

Obama Dec 27

Transcript scrolls with video.

which allowed users to watch the 2008 Presidential debates and speeches on demand;

Interactive video and transcript of Senators John McCain and Barack Obama debating in Oxford, Miss., on Sept. 26.

总统竞选辩论

watch

""We are witnessing the end of Rovian politics," Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google told me. And YouTube, which Google bought in 2006 for $1.65 billion, is one of the causes of its demise."

Great article on how the Internet has changed the elections, and probably the face of politics. Age has finally become an issue for John McCain. But the problem isn't the candidate's 72 years; it's the antediluvian approach of his campaign. McCain is running a textbook Rovian race: fear-based, smear-based, anything goes. But it isn't working. The glitch in the well-oiled machine? The Internet.

Arianna Huffington: "Back in the Dark Ages of 2004, when YouTube (and HuffPost, for that matter) didn't exist, a campaign could tell a brazen lie, and the media might call them on it. But if they kept repeating the lie again and again and again, the media would eventually let it go (see the Swiftboating of John Kerry). Traditional media like moving on to the next shiny thing. But bloggers love revisiting a story. So when Palin kept repeating her bridge to nowhere lie, bloggers kept calling her on it. Andrew Sullivan, for one, has made a cottage industry of calling Palin on her lies. And eventually, the truth filtered up and cost McCain credibility with his true base: journalists. "

" So when Palin kept repeating her bridge to nowhere lie, bloggers kept calling her on it. Andrew Sullivan, for one, has made a cottage industry of calling Palin on her lies. And eventually, the truth filtered up and cost McCain credibility with his true base: journalists. The Internet may make it easier to disseminate character smears, but it also makes it much less likely that these smears will stick."

Wow this is potentially huge! Thoughts? RT @timoreilly:Bulk Data Downloads:A Breakthrough in Government Transparency http://bit.ly/EizO3 [from http://twitter.com/jhelmus/statuses/1283585077]

On getting greater access to government documents and data, with an amendment now in the House

The Onion

exactly

No, really. It's true. The Onion wouldn't lie about these matters.

"The president seems to be someplace else lately," said one high-level official, speaking on condition of anonymity. "Yesterday we were all being briefed on the encroachment of Iranian drone planes into Iraq, when he just looked up from the table and blurted out, 'What am I supposed to watch on Fridays at 10 p.m. now? Numb3rs?'" "I haven't seen him this upset since Admiral Adama realized that Earth was actually an uninhabitable wasteland," the official continued . . .

Obama watched the finale just as he had every previous episode, alone in the White House screening room with the volume turned all the way up.

"I haven't seen him this upset since Admiral Adama realized that Earth was actually an uninhabitable wasteland," the official continued.

WASHINGTON—What am I supposed to watch on Fridays at 10 p.m. now? Numb3rs? blurted out a distraught Obama, in the middle of a briefing on Iranian drone planes.

cool way to do man on the street type feature

Interactive Vox Pop. Fantastic.

multimedia example -- interactive audio and photo -- ordinary citizens expressing their hopes for President Obama.

The Times asked more than 200 people to share their hopes for the Obama administration. Readers are invited to vote on favorites. avec intégration témoignages audio des interrogées qd ds mot.

What are your hopes for the Obama administration? The New York Times asked more than 200 people in 14 states (half red, half blue) to identify their greatest hopes for what Barack Obama might accomplish during his time as president. We grouped their responses into the 29 “hopes” below. Their answers do not represent any kind of scientific sample — they come from people who shared their thoughts outside supermarkets, at parks, in restaurants. We grouped their responses into the 29 “hopes” below. Click on each speech bubble to hear their voices, and then choose the hopes you agree with by clicking on “I Hope So, Too.” Use the tabs to see which hopes are the most popular. If your hope is not represented below, tell everyone about it by including it in the comment section.

This is the best.

Darwin artwork that parodies the famous Shepard Fairey Obama poster.

Praise the Lord, and pass the ammunition.

Heather Havrilesky, fantastic article and reader responses. God, I love Heather.

Nov. 7, 2008 | Dear boomers: We're sorry for rolling our eyes at you all these years. We apologize for scoffing at your earnestness, your lack of self-deprecation, your tendency to take yourselves a little too seriously.

"Your earnest, self-important prattle has gotten on Gen X nerves for decades. But now we finally get it... When we watched Barack Obama's victory speech on Tuesday night, we looked into the eyes of a real leader, and decades of cynicism about politics and grass-roots movements and community melted away in a single moment. We heard the voice of a man who can inspire with his words, who's unashamed of his own intelligence, who's willing to treat the citizens of this country like smart, capable people, worthy of respect. For the first time in some of our lifetimes, we believed."

commentary on case study cnn and facebook

8500

A look at the use of Facebook Connect for CNN and the Obama inauguration

soliders Raping women

Those torture photos Obama won't release are, according to the telegraph, rape pics. http://tr.im/mY1h [from http://twitter.com/thegrumpyowl/statuses/1982217964]

Photographs of alleged prisoner abuse which Barack Obama is attempting to censor include images of apparent rape and sexual abuse, it has emerged.

2009-05-27: Photographs of alleged prisoner abuse which Barack Obama is attempting to censor include images of apparent rape and sexual abuse, it has emerged. At least one picture shows an American soldier apparently raping a female prisoner while another is said to show a male translator raping a male detainee. Further photographs are said to depict sexual assaults on prisoners with objects including a truncheon, wire and a phosphorescent tube. Another apparently shows a female prisoner having her clothing forcibly removed to expose her breasts. Detail of the content emerged from Major General Antonio Taguba, the former army officer who conducted an inquiry into the Abu Ghraib jail in Iraq. Allegations of rape and abuse were included in his 2004 report but the fact there were photographs was never revealed. He has now confirmed their existence in an interview with the Daily Telegraph.

RT: whoawhoawhoawhoa @problemchylde I want to cry. http://bit.ly/12zc46 I want to cry. [from http://twitter.com/kismet4/statuses/1950798238]

The Cybersecurity Act gives the president the ability to "declare a cybersecurity emergency" and shut down or limit Internet traffic in any "critical" information network "in the interest of national security." does not define a critical information network or a cybersecurity emergency-- left to the president. grants the Secretary of Commerce "access to all relevant data concerning [critical] networks without regard to any provision of law, regulation, rule, or policy restricting such access." This means... can monitor or access any data on private or public networks without regard to privacy laws. The bill could undermine the Electronic Communications Privacy Act enacted in the mid '80s, requires law enforcement seek a warrant before tapping in to data transmissions between computers. might violate the Constitutional protection against searches without cause. Once information is accessed, it can be used for whatever purpose, no matter the original reason for accessing something

from the page: "The Cybersecurity Act of 2009 (PDF) gives the president the ability to "declare a cybersecurity emergency" and shut down or limit Internet traffic in any "critical" information network "in the interest of national security." The bill does not define a critical information network or a cybersecurity emergency. That definition would be left to the president... It also grants the Secretary of Commerce "access to all relevant data concerning [critical] networks without regard to any provision of law, regulation, rule, or policy restricting such access." ... When one person can access all information on a network, "it makes it more vulnerable to intruders," Granick says... "Once information is accessed, it can be used for whatever purpose, no matter the original reason for accessing something... Who's interested in this [bill]? Law enforcement and people in the security industry who want to ensure more government dollars go to them...""

Will Obama Shut the Internet Down. http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2009/04/should-obama-control-internet [from http://twitter.com/HenryDubb/statuses/1451549136]

Only now with the advent of Potato Day has tyranny come to our shores.

Very funny, or really scary? (Via Daring Fireball: http://daringfireball.net/linked/2009/04/09/baracknophobia ).

As the US presidential campaign enters its final weeks, both the Republican and Democratic candidates are hitting the swing states. But misconceptions and rumours abound and many voters have thei... As the US presidential campaign enters its final weeks, both the Republican and Democratic candidates are hitting the swing states. But misconceptions and rumours abound and many voters have their facts about the candidates all wrong. Some believe that Democrat Barack Obama is a Muslim, for instance. Casey Kauffman talked to some Republican supporters after a rally by Sarah Palin, the Republican vice-presidential candidate, in Ohio.

I know I shouldn't discount Republicans as being bad or dumb or crazy. I know that. But these are the ones that specifically concern me as being ridiculous. I am trying, but they make it hard!

Al Jazeera's 2 minute view of Ohio's battleground state.

Al Jazeera news video

"...the black will take over", "when you got a nigger running for president...", "...he's related to a known terrorist", "just the whole muslim thing...9/11", "...he thinks us white people are trash".....LISTEN TO THESE PEOPLE!! THESE ARE MCCAIN SUPPORTERS....But I honestly can say that McCain allowed Sarah Palin to feed these people, then he had to start cleaning up her mess. Their campaign is resorting to fear-mongering to win this election.

barack, obama, joe, klein, time, interview, democrat, democratic, politics, president, race, white, house, race, campaign, 2008

Joe Klein's perspective on Barack Obama

not an interview but the journalist talking about it...still pretty good. Liked the sync of the word "maturity" and his wedding ring at the end, kinda cool.

cool site showing front pages of major newspapers

Interactive museum

there is an expert here

Barack Obama has only four years to save the world. That is the stark assessment of Nasa scientist and leading climate expert Jim Hansen who last week warned only urgent action by the new president could halt the devastating climate change that now threatens Earth.

Barack Obama has only four years to save the world. That is the stark assessment of Nasa scientist and leading climate expert Jim Hansen who last week warned only urgent action by the new president could halt the devastating climate change that now threatens Earth. Crucially, that action will have to be taken within Obama's first administration, he added.

lets hope he gets on with it

Not only is he America's hope for relevance but now he has to save the world too. It would be funny if it were not true. If America doesn't take a leadership role in this too (along with the others who have already stepped forward I might add) then as the great Australian poems reads: "We'll All Be Rooned" said Hanrahan!

7 things to do on-line to help get involved and make a difference

Como utilizar a Internet para ajudar a transformar a America. 7 dicas que cada um de nós pode fazer na Internet para ajudar a restaurar América.

Col·lecció de "xapes" per a la campanya presidencial de Barack Obama

That's a whole lotta Barack 'n' Roll

An exhaustive collection of Obama buttons. It's certainly believable that it's a complete collection. Lots of good/interesting design here

open Letter to Republicans

Yikes: "Just imagine where America would be today if the 14 to 20 million voters -- 'the rube base' who slavishly follow the likes of Limbaugh -- had not voted as a block year after year thus empowering the Republican fiasco. We would have a regulated banking industry and would have avoided our current financial crisis; some 4000 of our killed military men and women would be alive; over to 35,000 wounded Americans would be whole; we would have been leaders in the environmental movement; we would be in the middle of a green technology boom fueling a huge expansion of our economy and stopping our dependence on foreign oil, and our health-care system would be reformed."

The worsening economic situation is your fault and your fault alone. The Republicans created this mess through 8 years of backing the worst president in our history and now, because you put partisan ideology ahead of the good of our country, you have blown your last chance to redeem yourselves. You deserve the banishment to the political wilderness that awaits all traitors.

republican sees the light

woo-hoo!!

nail hit squarely on the head!

Frank Schaeffer (one of the founders of the Religious Reich) rips Republicans a new one.

Tech-related aspects of Obama campaign.

Brian Solis asks if the same social media tools that Obama deployed to communicate “to” constituents could/would also be used to listen and interact with supporters as well as those who don’t currently endorse the President-elect?

This isn’t just about broadcasting content through new channels or merely soliciting feedback, participating in popular networks or actively listening. It’s the ability to identify and internalize themes to precipitate change and earn support through action—not just words. For the first time, the U.S. President can cultivate grassroots communities directly where people create, discover, and share information online. He is already thinking in this direction, as evidenced by his intention to record the weekly Presidential address on Youtube, in addition to broadcasting it over the radio. The videos will be hosted on Change.gov, with the first one already recorded. Other opportunities to engage with citizens online include:

Nice chart comparing tax plans.

Obama v McCain tax plans

Wash. Post. / NYTimes review of tax plans useful diagrams

I love that the Wall Street Journal writes this but never complained about Bush using fear mongering. Also I don't think he has fear mongered, I think Obama has presented evidence that backs up what he is saying.

the Great Depression are not only historically inaccurate, they're also dangerous. Repeated warnings from the White House about a coming economic apocalypse aren't likely to raise consumer and investor expectations for the future. In fact, they have contributed to the continuing decline in consumer confidence

Mr. Obama's analogies to the Great Depression are not only historically inaccurate, they're also dangerous. Repeated warnings from the White House about a coming economic apocalypse aren't likely to raise consumer and investor expectations for the future. In fact, they have contributed to the continuing decline in consumer confidence that is restraining a spending pickup.

WASHINGTON — The capital flew into a bit of a tizzy when, on his first full day in the White House, President Obama was photographed in the Oval Office without his suit jacket. There was, however, a logical explanation: Mr. Obama, who hates the cold, had cranked up the thermostat.

Honest Tea

The rug is still there, as are the presidential portraits Mr. Bush selected — one of Washington, one of Lincoln — and a collection of decorative green and white plates. During a meeting last week with retired military officials, before he signed an executive order shutting down the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, Mr. Obama surveyed his new environs with a critical eye. “He looked around,” said one of his guests, retired Rear Adm. John D. Hutson, “and said, ‘I’ve got to do something about these plates. I’m not really a plates kind of guy.’ ”

Great lyrics, typography, and visual effects on this hip-hop themed video.

McCain had to pay people to make calls for him...

"Some three dozen workers at a telemarketing call center in Indiana walked off the job rather than read an incendiary McCain campaign script attacking Barack Obama, according to two workers at the center and one of their parents."

Some three dozen workers at a telemarketing call center in Indiana walked off the job rather than read an incendiary McCain campaign script attacking Barack Obama, according to two workers at the center and one of their parents. Nina Williams, a stay-at-home mom in Lake County, Indiana, tells us that her daughter recently called her from her job at the center, upset that she had been asked to read a script attacking Obama for being "dangerously weak on crime," "coddling criminals," and for voting against "protecting children from danger." "They walked out," Williams says of her daughter and her co-workers, adding that they weren't fired but willingly sacrificed pay rather than read the lines. "They were told [by supervisors], `If you all leave, you're not gonna get paid for the rest of the day." The script coincided with this robo-slime call running in other states, but because robocalling is illegal in Indiana it was being read by call center workers.

events of 2008, People Who Mattered etc

No surprise here.

drupal open source code at whitehouse

RT @robpierson: opensourcing of @whitehouse website = 1 step closer to @timoreilly's vision of gov as platform: http://www.whitehouse.go ...

// What a great article.

The general stands and looks around the suite that his traveling staff of 10 has converted into a full-scale operations center. The tables are crowded with silver Panasonic Toughbooks, and blue cables crisscross the hotel's thick carpet, hooked up to satellite dishes to provide encrypted phone and e-mail communications. Dressed in off-the-rack civilian casual – blue tie, button-down shirt, dress slacks – McChrystal is way out of his comfort zone. Paris, as one of his advisers says, is the "most anti-McChrystal city you can imagine." The general hates fancy restaurants, rejecting any place with candles on the tables as too "Gucci." He prefers Bud Light Lime (his favorite beer) to Bordeaux, Talladega Nights (his favorite movie) to Jean-Luc Godard. Besides, the public eye has never been a place where McChrystal felt comfortable: Before President Obama put him in charge of the war in Afghanistan, he spent five years running the Pentagon's most secretive black ops.

Got the guy fired 06/23/10 ; ideally should get a bunch of others fired too, but probably won't, or not the important ones anyway.

The Spill, The Scandal and the President

The inside story of how Obama failed to crack down on the corruption of the Bush years – and let the world's most dangerous oil company get away with murder

Rolling Stone is on fire these days—The Spill, The Scandal and the President http://bit.ly/9X3rnW & The Runaway General http://bit.ly/97zeAS