Apps for America competition launches – cash prizes for best mash ups of government data
In conjunction with the Data.gov launch, Sunlight Labs in partnership with Google has launched the Apps for America 2 competition to find the best mash ups using US Federal government data.
Over US$20,000 is being given away for open source online applications using the Federal datasets at Data.gov based on the following criteria:
- Transparency: Does the app help citizens see things they couldn’t see before the app existed?
- Permanence: Will the app be usable over a long period of time? Does the idea have survivability?
- Design & Visualization: Does the app look great? Does the app visualize data in a new and interesting way?
The UK government holds similar competitions.
I wonder what innovation the Australian government could unlock if it made public data available in machine-readable formats, then held its own competition.