And on that point...

For all the whinging about complacency lately, this week has produced not one but two important citizen-led public projects aimed to bring transparency and accessibility to government.

Earlier this week we saw the launch of OpenParliament.ca.

Today, the launch of Datadotgc.ca.  In the words of its founder, it was created because "as citizens, we want our governments to open up and share their data, in useful, structured formats that people can actually use or analyze. Unlike our American and British peers, the Canadian Federal (and provincial...) government(s) currently have no official, coordinated effort to release government data. We think that should change.

But rather than complain, we thought we'd do something. This is our effort. A stab at showing our government, and Canada, what a federal open data portal could and should look like."

One of its goals is to showcase to the public which departments are sharing data.  So far, there are five: Natural Resources, Statistics Canada, Environment Canada, the Treasury Board Secretariat and Intergovernmental Affairs.  If you can, you should help.  Here's how to.

We the people, indeed.