Andrea Di MaioWe have heard many times about the role of mobile devices in rescuing people during natural disasters by following tweets, reading Facebook updates, looking at pictures on Flickr. We have also heard very often how crowdsourcing the solution to problems through idea or application contests can save money or improve quality of government services or operations.
But the example of the San Ramon Valley, Calif., Fire Protection District, is different. As reported by Government Computer News, they developed a free iPhone application that
notifies people who are trained in cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) if someone nearby might require the lifesaving technique. The app can direct responders, via Global Positioning System signals, to the closest publicly available Automated External Defibrillator. […] Alerts are sent out by 911 dispatchers via a computer-aided system, which notifies first responders as well as those signed up to receive CPR alerts via their iPhone or iPad.
This is a great way of blending crowdsourcing, resource location, and mobility. This can help save lives and reduce costs. And a great example that you do not have to wait for third parties and passionate developers to develop an AppFor(NameYourJurisdiction) based on open data: good idea can and do come from government too.
A longer description is available on O’Reilly Radar’s blog, where it is dubbed as an example of government as a platform. Maybe, but I’d rather say that citizens are the platform, and government is building an application using that platform.
Category: social networks in government Tags: government 2.0, iPhone
3 responses so far ↓
1 Alex Howard March 25, 2011 at 11:35 am
Facts:
1) A local government entity – a fire department – built and deployed an application that empowers citizens to help one another in a crisis.
2) The mobile application (which has since been adopted by San Francisco) creates the means for trained citizens to be alerted and connects them to first responders and the nearest AED.
In the post you link to, you state that “the real question to ask is whether the community can be a tool. it does not really matter what platform is supporting the community but the fact that the community exist and can support a mission-critical function.”
Your own words support a clear conclusion: this community can now collectively act because a platform was created for it to do so.
You may rather say that “citizens are the platform” — but it’s hard for this correspondent to see how that conclusion gibes with what’s happening here.
2 Andrea Di Maio March 25, 2011 at 12:01 pm
@Alex – The “government as a platform” storyline focuses on data that government provides for citizens and other stakeholder to use them via applications and other means: in many instances, applications are developed by the community using government data.
In this example government has developed an application that leverages the existance of a community. As I said in the previous post, it dioes not matter what platform supports the community, the key is that the community exists. So we agree, citizens and not government are the platform here.
3 tom short March 29, 2011 at 12:51 pm
Proximity-based services are finally reaching critical mass and maturity. This is great news! Thank you for catching this and passing it along, Andrea. Maybe it’s time to revise old saw, it ain’t what you know, it’s who you know. Now “It ain’t what you know, it’s who you’re near.” (!)