NYC BigApps contest winners announced; Avencia not included
The biggest example to date of contest-driven technology submissions for making government better hasn’t gone Philadelphia’s way.
Callowhill-based GIS software firm Avencia was Philadelphia’s lone representative in software application contest NYC BigApps, hosted by that city’ s government and aimed to foster more transparency and accountability. It didn’t turn out as they hoped.
Avencia’s Walkshed NYC, which, like its Philadelphia counterpart, allowed users to rate the ‘walkability’ of given neighborhoods by a host of qualities, able to be edited by the user, wasn’t one of a dozen winners or honorable mentions, chosen by public vote and a panel.
Many other cities, Philadelphia included, have discussed internally the possibility of such competitions, though they’ve been hard to come by.
A Brooklyn-based developer won first prize, which includes a $20,000 gift and lunch with the city’s mayor, with his WayFinder NYC, which finds the nearest train stations and gives directions to it.
Can real implementation and change be expected? Is this a novelty or something the city of Philadelphia should seriously consider?
2 Responses to “NYC BigApps contest winners announced; Avencia not included”
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Josh Tauberer on February 9th, 2010
Too bad for Avencia! I’m sure they put in a good showing.
” Can real implementation and change be expected? Is this a novelty or something the city of Philadelphia should seriously consider? ”
There’s certainly a novelty factor here. Most small-scale software projects don’t turn into long-term, sustainable products, and when you run a contest that encourages relatively small-scale projects you have to expect that this will happen often.
That said, I don’t think this is any reason not to keep doing it. We’re still at an early phase of the open government and civic hacking movement and no one knows where this will lead. Trying out and encouraging new things is an important part of exploring what tech can do for us here.
Christopher Wink on February 9th, 2010
I guess then the question is if this is the best way to bring in novel ideas: a contest for cash. The eventual victor didn’t actually offer anything in the way of government transparency — instead, directions to subway stops.
To be fair, this particular tool from Avencia wasn’t explicitly for reducing government waste or the like either.
Indeed, both — and many of the other participants — probably fall more into the novel category than transformative.
But yes, as you said Josh, we’re new to this game of tech teasing out government data, and it’s an exciting time. We hope to see Philadelphia take a big step into this space.
-cgw