"President-elect Barack Obama has long said he wants to create the position of chief technology officer in his cabinet, a person who will make government more accessible to citizens. The first step in that plan, reportedly coming later today, is the launch of a web site about the new administration’s transition into the White House. Not yet live, it’s called Change.gov.
The CTO’s mandate would be quite different from the Cybersecurity czar appointed under the Bush Administration. Bush’s czar helped defend against cyberattacks. Obama’s CTO, by contrast, would ensure government officials hold open meetings, broadcast live webcasts of those meetings, and use blogging software, wikis and open comments to communicate policies with Americans, according to the plan.
Specifically — and this will be very interesting if it actually happens — Obama wants the public to be able to comment on the White House website for five days before he signs legislation. (I wonder if the Obama campaign will use Facebook Connect so you can leave comments on pending legislation and let your Facebook friends see them? After all, Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes helped lead Obama’s web campaign.)"
Site is now live: http://www.change.gov/