Re: public announcement - draft 1

Posted by Tracey P. Lauriault-2 on Feb 21, 2006; 10:16pm
URL: http://civicaccess.416.s1.nabble.com/public-announcement-draft-1-tp256p290.html



Tracey P. Lauriault
Geomatics and Cartographic Research Centre (GCRC)
Dept. of Geography, 1125 Colonel By Dr., Ottawa (ON) K1S 5B6
(Off) [phone] ext 2252 (Home) [phone]
[hidden email] or [hidden email]

On Feb 20, "Michael Lenczner" <[hidden email]> wrote:

>
> Here's draft version 0.98 of the public announcement.
>
> Unless anyone has problems with it I would suggest that we use it.
> I'll wait 24 hours for comments/suggestions.
>
> ------------------------------------
>
>
> We would like to announce the launch of a new online space for
> Canadian civic engagement - Citizens for Open Access to Civic
> Information and Data (CivicAccess).  CivicAccess is being founded by
> librarians, civil servants, GIS and IT professionals, academics,
> lawyers, open-source advocates, and community planners from across
> Canada.  We are motivated by the belief that open civic information
> and data are necessary tools for being engaged citizens in an
> "information society".

remove - tools
>
> Our goals are:
>
> 1) to encourage all levels of government to make civic data freely
> accessible in open formats and to work with them to help make that
> happen.

change - freely accessible - to - accessible at no cost for non commercial purposes -
reason - freely is the current modis operanti but at a cost!  excluding freedom of
information (FOI).  non commercial is important as the assumption is that a business can
afford to do this.

>
> 2) to support projects that use new online technologies to enable
> citizens to easily find and share public information and data as well
> as to re-contextualize that information in ways that make it
> meaningful to them.

hugh's changes here?
>
> Access to civic information and data help us make informed choices as
> voters.  In addition they help to ensure government transparency and
> accountability - essential elements of a democracy. In addition these
> are the bits and bytes required to understand, critically analyze, and
> re-envision the communities in which we live.

>
> As engaged citizens of our neighborhoods, cities, and provinces we are
> working to develop a community of practice around open civic data in
> Canada.

change - of our - to - in our

>
> This is an idea whose time has come.  Please join us in making it a reality!
>
> signed:
>
> Names
>
>
>
>
> On 2/13/06, Stephane Guidoin <[hidden email]> wrote:
> >
> > > Basically, yup.  Hopefully we can get some of the biggies to blog it,
> > > too.  If someone wants to send it as a press release that would
> > > probably be okay as well - I'm not a PR guy so I don't know if there's
> > > any reason to try that.
> > >
> > > Anyone else have ideas?
> > >
> > >
> > To me there's a difference between invitation and press release. Actual
> > participants could send invitations to people they know. But  it could
> > be interesting to make a press release which is more an announcement
> > than an invitation.
> >
> > For example Online Rights Canada made a press release (I copied it there
> > after as a reminder). But obviously, we don't have the same target as
> > ORC : we want people to be participants and not spectators.
> >
> > The text Mike sent might not have the right tone to be added on a
> > website. But it's good when you make a invitation to someone you know.
> > To me, only the first sentence really needs to be changed to make
> > something more public and opened.
> >
> > Stef
> <snip>
>
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