
Code For America Open for Applications - aaronbrethorst
http://codeforamerica.org/2010/06/01/we-are-now-officially-recruiting-fellows/
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lincolnq
This is very _interesting_ , but (as a developer) doesn't seem _appealing_.

Apparently you live in San Francisco for a year, working on projects for
another American city. You visit the city for a month to meet people and
figure out what it is that you're actually doing, and then you go back to SF
in some kind of mentoring camp with other Fellows, and implement the idea.

I have a bad feeling about the requirements management problem. It's known to
be much better to be working onsite with your users, because communication
between users and developers is critical. How is this addressed?

Another big sticking point is the salary. $35k, and I'll be living in San
Francisco? It seems like a good web developer -- the kind you are trying to
recruit, right? -- would be paid a LOT more, even at a startup (where they
might have more impact, too). So it just doesn't feel right.

~~~
oldgregg
Getting paid 35k/yr to get abused by some asshole on the city council? Nobody
in their right mind would even consider this.

I guarantee nobody on their advisory board would sign up for this shit. If you
want to live in poverty there are lots of other things you could build on your
own that would have a much bigger impact.

A much better solution would be to run a job placement service so people
actually get paid. I don't see how them adding another layer of bureaucracy is
going to help anything.

~~~
thaumaturgy
> _Nobody in their right mind would even consider this._

I am.

I figure, either you can be part of the problem, or part of the solution. It's
so easy to just sit back and complain about the way things are all the time,
but it's much more interesting to actually try to change them.

'Sides, it would be a good introduction to dealing with municipal governments,
and that could be useful.

~~~
mmt
_I figure, either you can be part of the problem, or part of the solution._

False dichotomy.

 _It's so easy to just sit back and complain about the way things are all the
time, but it's much more interesting to actually try to change them._

It may be more _interesting_ to try, but it may not be any more productive.

More specifically, the most significant problems I might sit back and complain
about are ones that can't be solved with software[1], let alone custom
software.

The notion of targetting municipal government is suspect to me, as it reeks of
the enterprise software model. I may be misinterpretting what they're trying
to do, but, if not, it will be threatened by the same dangers, which means
that 7 months isn't nearly enough.

[1] ..or any technology by itself. I occasionally complain that programmers
have a tendency to believe that all (technical) problems can be solved in
software, but this goes well beyond that.

~~~
thaumaturgy
Again, the point isn't to attempt to solve a non-software problem using
software, it's to get a guided introduction to dealing with municipal
governments.

~~~
mmt
I guess I missed where that point is outlined, though I admit to not reading
all the backstory.

The title of the project obviously can't be taken literally, but I expect I'm
not the only technical person who would expect the point has something to do
with code.

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sumeetjain
Cities should just pay reasonable salaries to a couple developers and build
apps themselves.

"Each team returns to Bay Area headquarters and then has seven months to
develop their application for their city."

Nevermind the potential issues from giving development seven months without
having heard requirements. My question is, why just one application? Cities
are huge machines. I have enough trouble navigating around a single
councilwoman's website - let alone the DMV's. How is one application supposed
to service an entire city in a meaningful way?

Before reading the details of this program, I imagined it would be something
like this:

 _CFA puts you up in the city you'll be helping. Lodging, food,
transportation, etc.

Instead of visiting the city you're helping, you visit SF headquarters - for a
couple weeks, to go over your vision for development.

After identifying the applications that would be most beneficial to the city's
residents, you build them. The applications start small – you iterate as you
get feedback from citizens._

The benefit of this approach over CFA's is that you don't end up with one
monolithic application that is difficult to add functionality to. Instead, you
have a few examples of efficiency throughout the city. Enough examples,
hopefully, that other departments will be inspired to invest in their own
department's application.

~~~
dugmartin
Why even visit SF? Just setup a irc channel for all the devs and a weekly conf
call to deal with announcements and attaboys.

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CoryMathews
Where I work we do a lot of software development for cities ranging from
websites to applications. Most cities/departments are really reluctant to
bring in any new systems. regardless how much they help. So I don't see how
they would be able to do so much with what will more then likely be a bunch of
new developers.

They also have to go out for bids on everything..

~~~
biggitybones
This seems like it's trying to build public services based off of the data in
the cities' systems. On top of that, I think it's more of a non-profit so I'm
assuming (and perhaps incorrectly) that they'd be more welcome as a partner.

My thought is this is to spread some of the openness that cities like SF and
NYC (albeit at a much smaller level) have started.

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hello_moto
Seems like they're trying to do the CFA project more like a "startup" style:

\- SF -> checked

\- Small team -> checked

\- 2.0 -> checked

\- Web (?) -> checked

\- Ramen wage -> checked

\- Tight deadline -> checked

\- Unknown requirements -> checked

Plus health benefit and travel tickets. Minus bureaucracy (probably).

I don't think it's a bad idea. If you were to work there and be successful in
1-2 projects, you would get the following benefits:

\- Connection with government agencies

\- Experience delivering govt/municipal public solution (portfolio)

\- Having stayed at SF for a while (maybe stationed yourself there)

\- Probably connection to the startup scenes there (if they go to meetups)

You can join a startup afterward and get a bigger paycheck. Of course all of
these are probably more suitable for fresh-grad looking for an opportunity in
Silicon Valley.

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aditya
This is a pretty amazing opportunity for anyone that wants to help fix cities.
$35k stipend + travel + health and a chance at writing code that has meaning
and helps fix a real problem. Will be interesting to see the kind of things
that get built (and if the bureaucracy is beaten!)

More info on the program here: <http://codeforamerica.org/become-a-fellow/>

