The Sunlight Foundation just announced the winners of its Design for America contest, in which they asked designers to come up with innovative visualizations of government data, and things like redesigns of government websites. Not every one will change your life, but there are definitely some great ideas there. For instance, look at the proposal for a redesign of the IRS website by a design firm called A Good Company; then look at the big bag of nothing that is the actual IRS website. The difference shows just how useful, informative, and generally pleasing government websites could be, and how bad they often are.
Here's a quick video that shows some of what the Sunlight Foundation's contest inspired:
-- Paul Waldman
