Borrowing from federal CIO Vivek Kundra’s success with Web Services challenges for the District of Columbia in his Apps for Democracy challenge, the federal government is now poised to usher in an era of web services challenges for federal problem solving. A detailed 12-page memo was released on Monday to executive department heads and agencies that outlines the use of challenges for transparency and open government, with details on the potential benefits as well as an outline of many different types of prizes.
Geospatial tools are well poised to take advantage of this new Web Services paradigm shift, and individual developers as well as larger companies stand to benefit. With this big federal push, it stands to reason that states and local government will soon follow suit. If you’re a consultant or small service business owner, now’s the time to polish your web services skill sets and to forge alliances with other developers.
