Disappearing US Government Public Information
April 9, 2011
The goose is not going to honk too much about the shuttering of US government Web sites. Most of them get few hits. I know you think that millions of mouse potatoes rush to such thrillers as the US Department of Agriculture’s numerous Web sites or thousands of fact hungry MBAs explore the treasure trove of Department of Commerce content. The reality is that usage is not setting the world on fire.
An outfit called the Sunlight Foundation reported that a bunch of US government Web sites were going dark. The list appeared in “Budget Technopocalypse Deepens: Transparency Sites Will Go Dark In A Few Months.” How do you like that word “technopocalypse”? Felicitous, right?
Anyway, the alleged goners are:
- Apps.gov – Better hurry. Bring your credit card.
- Data.gov—Some interesting but often incomplete data sets
- IT Dashboard – Some spending information. Fascinating for the non economists
- Paymentaccuracy.gov – Love the charts
- USASpending.gov – Keep in mind the $1.6 trillion deficit and you are good to go.
No further comments from the goose.
Low traffic is the norm for most governmental Web sites. One happy exception for the US government is the IRS Web site at tax time. Traffic drops off after April 15th each year.
Coincident with the removal of sunshine data, the US government will notify me of changes in the terror alert level via Facebook and Twitter. Seems a fair trade I suppose.
Stephen E Arnold, April 9, 2011
Freebie
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