Examine the three general functions of digital government and the means by which national, state and local government communicate with the public on the internet. What are the major obstacles to clear and effective transmission of messages on these media, and how can they best be remedied?
The three general functions of the digital government to the public first is to provide information, second it allows the public to interact public officials and third it allows the public to request service.
The digital government has major obstacles concerning a clear and effective transmission of media to the public. The digital government has allocated a large amount of money which has been spent on the development and implementation of software for the digital government that has yielded an insignificant product. The outcomes and effects of digital government are often difficult to gauge or unsatisfactory. The developments of new software for government sites have contained bugs or errors that require extensive testing. The testing is required so when the software is released to be used in the public it won’t crash crippling the websites. The government does not have the technical staff to keep up with the maintenance of the websites which become outsourced to several contractors. These contractors often do not communicate with each other and lack experience in creating a user friendly site.
The digital government has many different platforms of web based sites for the public. The flow of information being exchanged by the the digital government can become overwhelming. The information often does not get delivered effectively to the public when transferring or sharing information causing the sites to become not manageable to the public user.
The digital government often does not offer the potential to reach many users including those who live in remote areas or have low literacy levels etc. They lack equal public access to the internet and reliability of information. When the digital government develops and becomes more sophisticated, individuals will be forced to interact electronically with the government on a larger scale. It can lead to a lack of privacy for civilians as their government obtains more and more information on them. The information being passed electronically between government and civilians can cause the government to have no limit to its authority regulating every aspect of public and private information. When the government has easy access to a vast amount of information on its citizens, personal privacy is lost. The government has the ability to add or remove information. There are very few organizations that monitor and provide accountability for these modifications.
The digital government clear and effective transmission of message can be remedied by effectively educating the public and creating a user friendly environment while online . By educating the public, individuals must learn that the information can be accessed via computer phone tablet etc. The digital government must offer alternatives for accessing the information for example at computers at libraries or at a city facility with personnel available for assistance. The information should be presented in a user friendly environment where a individual user can navigate around a web page and access the information easily with out any obstacles.