I had to do it, after all the work I put into helping them understand the value of an open ecosystem, and now they are strong-arming developers.

"NY MTA The Latest Public Transportation Group To Declare It Owns Facts"
http://techdirt.com/articles/20090814/0354395880.shtml

DIYcity is looking to talk with government CIOs and tech teams from cities everywhere.

As the age of open civic data gets underway, what are your needs, your challenges, your hopes, your uncertainties? How can non-governmental, public-facing organizations like DIYcity assist you in achieving your goals? What can you learn from our past year's experience of engaging city residents on the issue of civic software? And what can we learn from you, to make our site serve your community better?

We're having conversations with tech teams from cities around the world right now about these things, and we'd love to talk to you, too.

Contact us at diy@diycity.org and just say hi to get started.

Somehow a month has slipped by since my last post to DIYcity, and looking over the site it feels as though it could as easily have been a few years.

One thing is clear: it's time for a revised version of DIYcity. Not just a touchup, but a total revamp, a re-imagning of the site, one that holds true to the idea of creating Do-It-Yourself Cities everywhere, but that is more in step with where things are at the moment.

Luckily, that's exactly what we're working on.

It has taken me longer than expected to get this going. I've been putting together a team (more on that later). I've been talking with advisors. I've been talking with city CIOs. I've been weighing different ideas for implementation against each other.

In the meantime the field has continued to grow and evolve, and I think that evolution, and the evolution of ideas for DIYcity, are going to meet up and the results will be great. It's what an investor of ours at Outside.in once called "skating to where the puck is going to be".

So hang in there for a few more weeks. Please excuse the random foreign-language spammer who occasionally slips through the cracks to send out link-bait to everyone. We're on our way, we have one or two more hurdles to cross, and then it's a straight shot to a new DIYcity.

In the meantime, enjoy your summer.

Also, if you're interested you can follow me on O'Reilly Radar and on Huffington Post (and soon on NYFI...)

My name is Alec Resnick, and I'm working to start up an open community research and education lab with a focus on educational outreach and data visualization called sprout. You can check out a placeholder page at http://thesprouts.org -- that'll be changing pretty significantly in the next couple weeks.

But, that's kinda beside the point of this email. While talking to some potential partners for the nonprofit I'm starting, I met with some people at the Executive Office of Transportation (EOT) in Boston. They're really keen to bring together a handful of developers who might be interested in working with them to develop applications on top of the data they're beginning to collect and open up (stuff like traffic cams, traffic flow, MBTA schedules, etc.) A few other hackers will be getting together with the Josh Robin and Chris Dempsey from the EOT to talk about what developers would like to see from the EOT and to discuss the potential for hacking on the data the EOT is opening up.

If you're interested, feel free to comment here or shoot me an email at alec::at::thesprouts.org. The EOT was hoping to meet with developers sometime next week, but they're flexible. . .

I recently bought one of those "PowerMonitor" sensors from Black and Decker; it's a cool little thing, and works surprisingly well.

Anybody out there discovered any hack potential in it yet? Short of Zigbee meters, it might be a good stop-gap solution to collect power usage data?

-Jeff

The Golden Leaf Foundation is holding a community forum at LCC's Waller Auditorium, July 13th at 6:00pm.

The purpose of the forum is to inventory and discuss key issues and assets that are important to Lenoir County. The meeting is part of the Community Assistance Initiative, a grantmaking process targeting economically distressed communities across North Carolina.

Contact Courtney Mills or Pat McCabe of the Golden Leaf Foundation for more information. http://www.goldenleaf.org.

This may be a good place to discuss with people from all over the world about what is going on in Hamburg in urbanism and digital media. So feel free to share your inspirations and ideas for urban planning 2.0!

Hi DIYcity

The City of SF has undertaken an experiment to develop an open source platform with the community that will help improve public access to raw government data in machine readable formats. We see a great opportunity to work with other cities and developers in creating technology that is re-usable, free and open source to solve a common challenge. As members of DIYcity, this might be of interest.

You can learn more at our wiki and if you’re technically inclined check out our documentation. Our next open meeting is 7/2 @17:00 PDT dial in: 219-509-8111 [252380#]

http://apps.sfgov.org/opendata
http://apps.sfgov.org/opendata/index.php/Documentation

Jay Nath
jay [dot] nath (at)sfgov[dot]org

Hi DIY SF

The City of SF has undertaken an experiment to develop an open source platform with the community that will help improve public access to raw government data in machine readable formats. We see a great opportunity to work with other cities and developers in creating technology that is re-usable, free and open source to solve a common challenge. As members of DIY SF, I’m writing to you to see if there is any interest in this initiative.

You can learn more at our wiki and if you’re technically inclined check out our documentation. Our next open meeting is 7/2 @17:00 PDT dial in: 219-509-8111 [252380#]

http://apps.sfgov.org/opendata
http://apps.sfgov.org/opendata/index.php/Documentation

Jay Nath
jay [dot] nath (at)sfgov[dot]org

Hi all,

Come join us for a meetup to solicit ideas, interest, participants and planners in the upcoming Breakout! Festival on July 1 at 6:45pm at New Work City (200 Varick Street, Suite 507b).

This summer the BREAKOUT! Festival will return creative work to the
streets of New York. Using coworking as a model, and injecting
lightweight versions of essential office infrastructure into urban
public spaces, BREAKOUT! will explore new and productive niches for
working outside of traditional office buildings. BREAKOUT! seeks to
create a new architecture for the creative city by appropriating
public spaces for the collaborative knowledge work that drives the
contemporary city.

This meetup gathers together fans, volunteers, and planners interested
in helping make outdoor coworking and the BREAKOUT! Festival a
success.

The Agenda? Discuss:
* the upcoming New York Festival (September 18th - October 30th)
* ideas for facilitating breakout sessions
* cool things needed for breakouts
* how to participate in a breakout
* how to do more

Please RSVP here:
http://www.meetup.com/BreakoutNow/calendar/10729904/

Website: http://www.breakoutfestival.org/

Hope to see you there!

Cheers,
Elysse