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Only 17% of UK local authorities are creating websites that can be viewed adequately on a mobile device, despite the fact that almost a third of people accessing online council information are now using such devices, according to the Society of IT Management (Socitm). The findings come as part of this year’s “Better Connected” review [...]

Major failures in two pieces of high-profile technology that were intended to make the recent Kenyan national elections run more smoothly are to be investigated by a special committee of the Law Society of Kenya (LSK). The glitches in March meant the country had to rely on traditional methods of polling and vote-counting. Biometric voter [...]

A series of ‘digital health hubs’ are being set up across the UK to teach digital skills and train people to use the internet to improve their knowledge about health, nutrition, wellness and fitness issues. The project is the result of a partnership between the Online Centres Foundation, which manages digital inclusion network UK online [...]

One year ago, E-Government Bulletin published a special report on BeNeighbors.org, an initiative from the pioneering non-profit E-Democracy.org to connect communities in two neighbouring US cities – Minneapolis and St Paul, known as the Twin Cities – using online forums (see E-Gov Bulletin 346: http://bit.ly/XnE5T0). Funded with a 625,000 US Dollar grant, the project had [...]

A project to create a standard way of formatting data on Parliamentary proceedings, from politicians’ speeches to committee papers, could open up major new areas of democratic research, the programme’s leader has said. The LIPARM project (Linking Parliamentary Records through Metadata) was a one-year project to create an XML metadata schema – a standard way [...]

The tracking of live data streams could be a key factor in creating responsive public sector policy-making and service delivery in all parts of the UK, not just cities, according to a new report from the Society of IT Management (Socitm). ‘Smart cities: how are they really different?’ ( http://bit.ly/13kY6uE ) says the use of [...]

A grassroots digital inclusion project that toured the UK with an internet station in a portable cabin, helping residents increase their computer skills, is looking to start up again during 2013 and has put a call out for host destinations. Our Digital Planet ( http://bit.ly/VICWRV ) was run by social investment body Nominet Trust during [...]

By Craig Thomler Most governments use taxation to raise the majority of their revenue. In its simplest form, tax involves taking a share of the income earned by eligible entities, whether individuals or corporations, and placing the money in a pool. The government then decides how to spend this pool of money – on providing [...]

People who want to launch effective online movements must focus on building for the long-term, not on short-term viral phenomena, a global pioneer of online campaigning told a London meeting recently. Jeremy Heimans, co-founder of online petitions pioneer Avaaz (http://www.avaaz.org) was in the UK in November to launch Purpose Europe, the European arm of his [...]

A project to equip a town centre with free Wi-Fi is on track to meet its target fund after setting out to be “crowdfunded” online, E-Government Bulletin has learned. The “Make Mansfield Your HotSpot” project was developed by Mansfield Business Improvement District, a partnership between the council and local business community. It is being run [...]