Over on the White House blog, Beth Noveck, Deputy Chief Technology Officer for Open Government, writes that the administration is officially ending the “brainstorming” portion of its Open Government Dialogue process tonight at midnight. Noveck states that the administration will begin reviewing the submissions for preparation of the “discussion” phase which begins on June 3rd.  The brainstorming phase, however, was incredibly short and wrought with problems which I will outline below.  I only hope that the administration’s subsequent steps in the process represent dramatic improvements.

My problems with the way the brainstorming session went are as such:

• The compressed timetable.  The brainstorming phase is scheduled to last only one week encompassing Memorial Day weekend.  Reasonable ideas are still showing up, but they will not get many votes if the process ends as scheduled.  Also, the entire process from brainstorming to drafting is expected to take one month, which seems unrealistic.
• There has been a lack of clarity about the process.  Is voting merely a tool for interaction, or does it have a bigger role, perhaps even determining which ideas will get the administration’s consideration?  Will agency comments be included for public response?  Why were comments submitted to the administration earlier not included for vote and comment in the brainstorming process?  Are they experimenting with a new process, or is this merely going to be tacked on to the existing rulemaking process?
• The quality of the website itself leaves much to be desired.  The search capability is extremely limited.  It is impossible to sufficiently edit ideas you have posted; for example, you cannot change the title of an idea, its category, or how it is tagged.  It is not possible to compare similar ideas and build off of them, or download all of the comments.  The site also has several errors, most glaringly inaccurate counts of the number of posts made by a user.
• Is voting the right way to do policy?  Many of the recommendations, including some of the top vote getters, are not germane to the discussion of open government and executive branch transparency.  Before registration was necessary to vote, people were able to vote multiple times for each idea.  Also, the website reports on who voted for each idea and how

I do, however, give the administration kudos for being innovative and making a real effort to adhere to its commitment to a collaborative and participatory process for open government.  There is real potential here that this system may yield new voices and ideas.  Noveck also states that the brainstorming site will still be running and accepting new submissions through June 19th so this is also positive, but she makes no indication as to how those additional recommendations will be considered, if at all.  Further, it is clear that the government is not waiting for these recommendations in order to pursue open government policies.  The innovation gallery is a clear example of this.