These are my links for October 24th through October 25th:

• What I (nearly) said at Government 2010 – Neil has some very well structured thinking on government, online consultation/conversation and who's job it is: "People have jobs already. Busy ministers and officials can be forgiven for thinking it’s my job and that of my team to communicate online for them. Challenge is to understand their world, the pressures they’re under, the things they want to achieve, and show how digital can help them do that quicker/better."
• genzai·chi » MuseumNext: wild ideas about participation – Nikki on Museums: "I gained a lot through speaking with museum (and psychology!) professionals of all sorts and it has really helped me to better appreciate the sorts of issues institutions might be trying to address through the use of games and playful experiences. Also what the main concerns they may have in doing this and where likely pitfalls may be."
• Urban Interface Policy – VURB – "In the smart city, what is written as programmatic software ‘code’ can easily become defacto ‘law’ as it imposes permissioning schemes and identity regimes on it’s participants. So far, the internet, and the open source software that powers much of it, has remained remarkably adaptable to the ideals of democratic and egalitarian societies. Every infrastructural advance, however, goes through a watershed moment where the governing design principles of the technology itself begin to influence the types of societal experiences they might produce. We need to attempt to understand the cultural ramifications of such infrastructural design decisions in this context"
• Who’s not using the internet? | Culture | The Observer – "Access to the internet, and the ability to navigate the web has, for example, been shown to produce a significant rise in social confidence among 60 per cent of those who had previously been excluded, while in recent studies of internet usage among individuals who considered themselves to be depressed, "feelings of loneliness" decreased in 80 per cent of cases once people got online, and depressive symptoms were "cured" in 20 per cent of cases. Virtual conversations and interactions are now widely argued to be just as important as "real world" encounters in making people feel attached to a community, or part of a network."
• Chinese city launches citizen feedback system | Articles | FutureGov – Solutions for Government | Education | Healthcare – The Chinese municipal government of Dalian has launched a user evaluation and electronic monitoring system to gauge the popularity and usefulness of its citizen-facing web sites, and to respond faster to complaints from the public.
• Petition to: Encourage the Royal Mail to offer a free postcode database to non-profit and community websites. | Number10.gov.uk – You might like to sign Stuart Harrison's Downing Street petition: "We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to Encourage the Royal Mail to offer a free postcode database to non-profit and community websites"