Support Government Transparency with NYC BigApps
Posted by Merrin
We’re thrilled to power the NYC BigApps competition launched last Tuesday at the New York Tech Meetup. This initiative challenges developers to create software applications to deliver information from the NYC.gov Data Mine to interested users. All applications must be submitted by December 8th, 2009. A total of $20,000 will be offered in awards, plus dinner with the Mayor and tons of public appreciation from supporters like you.
Regardless of whether you’re a software developer, you can add your support and share it with your friends on the competition home page. Thousands of people from all over the world have already done so. When the winners are chosen, they’ll get credit on their ChallengePost pages for having helped all of the supporters.
As part of a larger effort to increase government transparency, innovation, accessibility, and accountability, the City has provided contestants with over 170 municipal data sets from approximately 30 city agencies, including schedules of citywide events, weekly traffic updates, restaurant inspections, property sales and geographic locations of all sidewalk cafés, laundry facilities, playgrounds, dog runs, and city landmarks. It’s one of the largest competitions any city has ever put together.
The competition was first announced in June by Mayor Bloomberg, who stresses the competition’s encouragement of local entrepreneurship and ability to inject even more vitality into the vibrant NY startup culture.
Submissions will be judged by a panel of leaders in the tech field, including representatives from Union Square Ventures, FirstMark Capital, EDVentures, NY Tech Meetup, Betaworks, Mahalo, AlleyCorp, and DFJ Gotham Ventures. The competition is open to individuals and small organizations. Apps will be judged based on their potential benefit to residents, visitors, and the government; originality; visual appeal; effect on data accessibility and government transparency; and commercial potential. If interested, you should read the full listing of official rules.
The awards ceremony will take place in January 2010, where a total of 13 awards and $20,000 will be presented to the winners. You can show your support of this initiative by clicking here!
