Mr Wales Goes to Washington

Jimmy Wales testified before the United States Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs on Tuesday (Washington time) on collaborative technologies generally and the Wikimedia projects specifically, and how that relates to e-Government initiatives in the United States.

Among other things, Jimmy discussed the use of both internal and public-facing wikis for governmental communication, explained semi-protection to Joe Lieberman, and outlined the benefits of systems that are designed to be open rather than closed. Also testifying were Karen Evans from the US government's Office of Management and Budget, John Needham from Google, and Ari Schwartz from the Center for Democracy and Technology.

You can view video of the hearing on Youtube or download it here in Real format (be aware that it's two hours long), see Jimmy's prepared testimony here (PDF) or see other statements here.