Our very own Max Ogden has been selected to participate at Ignite Portland 9 and Ignite Boston 2! Ignite is a high-energy event where Max will present his big idea along with 19 other participants.  The forum is fast-paced, fun and thought provoking. Each participant has five minutes and 20 slides to introduce their big ideas …

The basis for Max’s big idea started in the fall of 2009 when he joined an open source initiative led by the city of Portland.  The overall objective was to unlock the cities data and make it public. The data could then be accessed by anyone, in particular local developers so that they could build applications that pulled the data. An example, Max created an iPhone application that helps Portlanders find local food carts and then maps their location.  This is possible because the data was made public and Max (and others) created a common platform for developers to access the information.

Max has been instrumental in helping the Portland government agencies publish their raw data in a way that local developers can understand. In fact, he received an award from the Mayor of Portland, Sam Adams, for Best Use of Data App.

So, in a few days he’ll be sharing his ideas in Boston and then in Portland.  At Ignite Boston 2, he’ll focus on the geospatial component and how he used GeoCouch to turn raw data into easy to access bits of information. Which in turn allows local developers to develop tools and applications that transforms the data into ‘digestible’ and relevant information for local communities. 

Then he’ll be back with five minutes to wow the crowd at Ignite Portland 9, where he’ll focus on The Civic Web.  In Portland, Max will highlight how he partnered with the local government agencies and other developers to unlock the data hidden in the halls and walls of Portland’s civic entities.  

Max defines the civic web … “The civic web is your neighborhood as a platform.  Your neighborhood is where you work, where you raise your children and where you invest time and emotion.  Where the social web tries to reinvent and replace real life conversation, the civic web simply tries to augment the systems we already use.” 

To learn more about Max's project visit http://www.pdxapi.com or follow him on Twitter at @maxogden