Past, Present and Future of Civic Tech
summary
History and concrete outcomes: a civic tech pipeline launches Code for America in 2009, spins up US Digital Service and 18F, and intervenes on healthcare.gov rescue where ad hoc teams and endless standups stabilize the site. Local pilots consolidate thousands of agency pages into one platform, a 13‑person team redoes a login in 13 weeks, and fellowships seed capacity but do not scale by themselves. Work targets procurement rules, modular agile builds, measurable reductions in waste, and fixes that stop kids being placed in unsafe homes.
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chapters (18)
- 0:00Civic tech history intro
- 3:05Web 2.0 to gov software
- 7:18Gov as service provider
- 10:30Code for America launch
- 15:02Measuring civic tech success
- 17:32Pushback from contractors
- 22:31Procurement reform role
- 27:26Scaling beyond fellowships
- 31:34Learning from the UK Government Digital Service
- 35:10US Digital Service founding
- 37:17Healthcare.gov rescue
- 41:45Why software fails
- 43:3218F and state services
- 46:07Political transitions
- 49:22Ethics in civic tech
- 53:11State-level impact
- 57:14Devs in civic tech
- 1:00:32Q&A