Federal Rules Don't Mesh With MySpace
A Cabinet-level office that has been a leader in embracing new communications technologies has not put up a Facebook or MySpace profile in part because of the difficulty it would have in attempting to keep internal records of everything that might take place on such pages. "The federal government requires everything we post online to be archived as a record internally," said Rafael Lemaitre, a spokesman for the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy.
While the agency has been able to set up an archiving system for its official blog posts and messages on Twitter, a microblogging site, it has found it much more difficult to meet the records requirement for other online technologies. "How do you keep records of status updates, photos and correspondence on Facebook internally?" Lemaitre asked. "Maybe in the next administration we can figure out a way to do that."
President-elect Barack Obama has made online transparency and citizen participation priorities for his administration. But balancing the quest to use new technologies with the need to preserve information will pose a challenge to the new administration, as evidenced by the continuing struggle to preserve the electronic records of the Bush White House.
But if a balance can be struck between direct communication and posterity, the benefits could run both ways, according to Darrell West, director of Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution. "The virtue of social networking is that it provides two-way communications," he said in an e-mail. "Public officials can put information out to the public, and citizens can communicate with the government. Technology would help reduce the current gap that exists between government and the people."
"Government officials should be lenient in allowing agencies to experiment with digital technologies," West recommended. "There are lots of ways these tools can improve accountability, outreach, transparency and responsiveness. We shouldn't let 20th century restrictions interfere with 21st century communications."
The Office of National Drug Control Policy has taken a number of steps to embrace new technology, launching the first blog of a Cabinet-level agency in 2005 and beginning its Twitter messaging last August. (The blog draws over 80,000 unique visitors a month, the agency says, but only about two dozen people current have subscribed to the Twitter feed.) ONDCP also claims to be the first federal agency to have used YouTube, although it doesn't seem to have stuck with the effort -- the most recent video on its YouTube channel was added two years ago. -- Winter Casey
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