18 June 2009 · accounting, corruption, government, guardian, open, politics, simon, willison

Originally published at https://holdenweb.blogspot.com/2009/06/technology-for-keeping-people-honest.html

Simon Willison and his team at the Guardian in the UK have brought a dream a step nearer to becoming true for me with his new Investigate Your MP's Expenses site. After looking at government profligacy in the USA I decided the only thing to do was to open up public accounts to public scrutiny.

Simon's site (quite independently conceived) is a practical demonstration of the idea's feasibility on a large scale. All we need now is a sponsor with deep pockets and an interface to Mechanical Turk. The next election is going to be interesting.

accounting corruption government guardian open politics simon willison