The Cabinet Office has published an action plan that details deadlines for when it hopes to implement the IT strategy it announced in March this year. By the end of this month Francis Maude's department will release strategies for "End User Devices, Cloud, ICT Capability, and Greening Government ICT". The minister said that …

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Friday 21st October 2011 08:52 GMT amanfromMars 1

Perfect Storm Clouds for TitanICQ Rains? ... and AI Live Test of an Enigmatic Colossus v2.0?

"Social media and other online tools are used increasingly by citizens around the world to effect change. It is important that government harnesses these technologies to allow citizens to have increased dialogue and involvement with the development of policies and have greater visibility of the decision-making process." ..... the Cabinet Office [whoever that might be]

Oh please, you're 'avin' a larf, matey and really making a grandstanding fool of yourself/yourselves.

Just ask anyone who is more than just au fait with what this new fab technology/digitally manipulative binary command and control communications utility/facility can so easily do, and would have wished to talk the talk and walk the walk with governments, and who would have made virtual contact with the Cabinet Office and Ministries and Services of Defence and National and International Security, to discover that they really haven't got much of a clue about what to do about it and IT, because of what it and IT can do in revealing what they have been doing, and that is petrifying them and guaranteeing that they themselves are terrified of using the technology, and engaging with those who are not. And they who are not terrified of fully using all the binary tools of digital technology, are so blessed because of what they have done, and would know of what needs to be done so that others are as free to use and build upon works as are digitally created and mentored and monitored.

Who champions LOVE and CHAOS* for Blighty in that/those Virtual Reality Fields of Applied Dynamic ProgramMING? A name, a department, an email address are all that anyone would need in order to feed and seed a nation with that which is presently missing and desperately required in the UK government. And of course, someone to receive them at the other end with more than just a titter of wit and intelligence to guarantee applications and provide invaluable assistance to those whose ignorance in such matters is terrifying ....and rendering them petrified and extremely ineffective and vulnerable to valid claims of them being frauds and cuckolds of leaders and totally unfit for future exercise of high politically correct office.

* ..... Live Operational Virtual Environments/Clouds Hosting Advanced Operating Systems.

Meanwhile, those who are as expert as experts can be, in what is still really only just born and a recently added and freely available discipline in a novel field with myriad relative spider arms/legs/feeder and seeded networks internetworking, and who would be able to fully use and manipulate users of the technology with a sublime impunity via proprietary methodologies providing an stealthily cloaked and active immunity in cloudy and tempestuous environments ..... and they are Prized Primed Intellectual Property Protocols for NEUKlearer HyperRadioProActive IT AIdVentures in Creative CyberSpace Command and Control of Computers and Communications Systems for SMARTer Applications ProgramMING ..... forge ahead with global offers to any and all who would be unafraid to wield ITs Powers of Universal Leverage with AI Remote Virtual Controls.

Can you imagine the Export Potential of such AI ProgramMING and the Gross Value of ITs Equity on the Open Markets. MeThinks it would be Positively Obscene even by todays perverse standards which throw billions and trillions around as if they were next to nothing.

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Friday 21st October 2011 11:01 GMT Elmer Phud

So that's where all the money goes

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Friday 21st October 2011 12:11 GMT John Rose

Contracts for SMEs

The government policy on OSS contracts is completely inoperative. In fact, the government policy on allowing SMEs to bid for contracts is also inactive. I've signed up for biddiing for contracts but there are never any advertised in the Midlands region. Does anyone know how to find out about contracts for SMEs?

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Friday 21st October 2011 12:14 GMT Charles Parker

"As a first step, to facilitate a two-way dialogue with citizens, departments"

The telephone was invented quite a while ago...... Gov needs to be citizen centric, ie. providing a service.. not finding a nice little quiet job reading the newspaper in a locked room on the 14th floor...

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Friday 21st October 2011 12:18 GMT D Moss Esq

Can anybody find a useful job for the Cabinet Office to do?

The Government ICT Strategy - Strategic Implementation Plan, moving from the "what‟ to the "how" is available at http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/sites/default/files/resources/govt-ict-sip.pdf

"The approach set out in this plan ensures that departments will now work in a collegiate way", it says on p.4. In the light of past experience, unlikely. The reason Transformational Government failed back in 2006-07 was precisely that other departments didn't turn up to meetings called by the Cabinet Office. The drubbing handed out to the Cabinet Office by the Department of Health a few weeks ago suggests that nothing has changed. Francis Maude, Ian Watmore, Joe Harley and Liam Maxwell have no authority.

"... we can drive down our costs by creating a more open and competitive marketplace ...", it says on pp.4-5. Heard that one before. It's never happened. Why should it happen now?

"This ... comprehensive implementation plan ... will ... increase digital inclusion ... and ensure information is shared", it says on p.5. How will it increase digital inclusion? There are still nearly 10 million people in the country who have never used the web. The Cabinet Office couldn't get the other departments to share information before -- how will they make them share now? Do we want them to share? Is that a good thing?

"Successful implementation of the Strategy in central government is projected to deliver over £460m savings in-year in 2014/15", it says on p.7. That's not very much. It's less than was wasted on FiReControl. It's less than the begging letter CSC have on the table at the Department of Health (£3 billion, please). And the savings depend on the strategy being implemented successfully. When did that last happen?

"... the government‟s priority areas of activity are the creation of an environment for a common and secure ICT infrastructure ...", it says on p.10. Secure? Everyone from the Pentagon down seems to operate insecure websites. How is the Cabinet Office going to avoid the same fate?

October promises to be a busy month. The Cabinet Office intend to publish their Cloud Computing Strategy, End User Device Strategy, Green ICT Strategy and ICT Capability Strategy (a slim volume), see p.14. That's a lot of publishing. What's it meant to achieve?

There is an answer. See p.56, Channel Shift, The Challenge, the Cabinet Office are going to "make the lives of citizens simpler and easier". So, just like ID cards.

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Friday 21st October 2011 12:24 GMT Robert Grant

"the thorny issue of procurement of such products within government"

Don't forget the thorny issue of why we need procurement departments for IT when open source software is involved.

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Friday 21st October 2011 22:40 GMT Will Godfrey

Gawd!

Whatever you do, don't try to read that twice or you'll get caught up in an ever diminishing logic loop!

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Friday 21st October 2011 23:04 GMT Anonymous Coward

Anon

innovate.direct.gov.uk

God, they paid £1.6m for someone to do a basic Drupal setup; using the MS Acquia installer from what it looks like, so maybe 2 to 3 hours work. They then lifted a load of data right off data.gov.uk.

What REALLY gets me is that they could not even be bothered to upload their own image. Someone just opened the Acquia default 'marina' logo, pasted the DirectGov logo in its place and saved the files into the theme folder. How lazy is that?

Give me £1.6m and, as genuine Drupal developer I guarantee that I will not use someone else's hard work and charge HMG for it. In fact I will do it for £1.5m! How's that for saving money on IT?

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