I.M.B. and Local Governments Unite

Source: Loher, Steve. "To Do More With Less, Governments Go Digital". The New York Times. 11 October, 2009. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/11/business/11unboxed.html?_r=1&ref=technology

Summary: State and local governments feel their political pressures are calling for action, and that action is the use of the technology. I.M.B. threw a conference, along with Brookings Institution, in New York this month with the theme "Smart Cities". They expressed that money is to be made by helping local governments "tackle thorny problems in traffic management, energy use, public health, education and social services — and that technology has an important role to play" (Loher). They continued on about how the government holds so much data, from building permits to Medicaid cases, and that technology is its organizing answer. “The mistake people make is to think that collecting the data is the endgame,” said Michael R. Bloomberg, the mayor of New York, "We actually use the data” (Loher). Of course, this wouldn't be the first time that New York has taken a rush with this kind of service. In 2002, the city began a “311” telephone number to answer questions about government services and in 2006 the city began NYC Business Express, an online service, to make it easier and quicker to start a business. On top of all that the New York Fire Department, in partnership with I.B.M., is developing a system that allows firefighters to call up building information on hand-held wireless computers on their way to a fire. California and Dubuque, Iowa have also caught up on this fad train and have started using these data warehouses. “For us, it’s a living lab,” said Robert Morris, head of services research at I.B.M. “We want to learn things in Dubuque and then export the best practices” (Loher). The true hope is to to create technology and skills that can be spread from statewide, to nationwide, and then possibly worldwide.

Response: It seems rather strange that our world has become so dependant on technology. Just look at the New York examples above, from service telephone numbers to answer questions to online access to begin businesses. Yet, there is the firm fact that its through technology that we are able to accomplish so much and reach such a wide audience. Through my own experiences, I've come to learn that computers and phones make things easier to organize, so I think this was a smart move of I.M.B. and state governments to follow through with this. Our government has so many things that they need to keep track of and this is an easy solution. And it isn't just sticking at a political level, businesses are finding it just as useful. Through these data systems, businesses will be able to run quicker and easier than ever. Not only that, but by taking this technology route, they are able to reach out and spread their businesses worldwide. Good luck to I.M.B.'s goal of creating a developed system that can be sold nationally, and hopefully, throughout the world. Some thing deep down in my gut says that they just might reach it.