Changing the Relationship: Government and Residents

Civic User Testing Group * @smartchicago * @danxoneil

Smart Chicago Collaborative

Civic User Testing Group * @smartchicago * @danxoneil

• Access: if a resident is not connected to the network, they’re nowhere

• Skills: if they don’t know how to coax the Internet, they’re not really anywhere

• Data: if there’s nothing meaningful to look at, where does that leave all of us?

Civic User Testing Group * @smartchicago * @danxoneil

Development idiosyncrasy

Civic User Testing Group * @smartchicago * @danxoneil

• Governments publish lots of great data, but standards are slow in coming

• Developers make lots of apps, but often without talking to anyone outside their circle

• Residents request access to information, but often it is divorced of structure

Civic User Testing Group * @smartchicago * @danxoneil

So we started the CUTGroup

Civic User Testing Group * @smartchicago * @danxoneil

• A set of regular residents who get paid to test civic apps

• Inside public computer centers (Access)

• Where we teach each other about technology (Skills)

• And developers hear direct feedback from residents about their products (Data)

Civic User Testing Group * @smartchicago * @danxoneil

ACCESS: Engaging in situ

Civic User Testing Group * @smartchicago * @danxoneil

• Inside public computer centers– libraries, health centers, community rooms

• Engaging not just residents, but librarians and computer IT people

• Experiencing these rooms as residents, not just funders or developers or researchers

Civic User Testing Group * @smartchicago * @danxoneil

SKILLS: Learning while making

Civic User Testing Group * @smartchicago * @danxoneil

• Everyone learns– residents learn about civic apps, developers learn about user testing, governments learn about people care about

• Engagement through technology: lasting relationships through shared interfaces

• All of this in a different mode of engagement– less heat, more light

Civic User Testing Group * @smartchicago * @danxoneil

DATA: Honing our work

Civic User Testing Group * @smartchicago * @danxoneil

• Residents are users• Users are everything• This is the most common

mantra of startups• We’ve got to make things that

people can’t live without• Things that they love

Civic User Testing Group * @smartchicago * @danxoneil

Let’s do this.

Civic User Testing Group * @smartchicago * @danxoneil

• http://cutgroup.smartchicagoapps.org/• doneil@cct.org• @danxoneil• @smartchicago• /smartchicago