Copyright Law

Tim O'Reilly hails Obama's selection of Aneesh Chopra as Chief Technology Officer

By Ty Rogers and Ray Beckerman

My first reaction was to question why a non-technical person was selected by President Obama as his choice for Chief Technology Officer.

But in this interesting article, the very well respected Tim O'Reilly counsels us that it was a brilliant, very much pro-technology, very much "Government 2.0", choice.

But see debate going on at Slashdot over the wisdom of the appointment, where one Slashdot commenter says:

I've seen this at a lot of organizations, the CIO is invariable a non-techie hired on for his skills at schmoozing management than any tech knowledge. Management find real techies a threat as they might get found out. They mostly spend their time quoting the tech press and spouting phrases like 'integrated innovation' and 'empowerment'. The top man specifically hires people dumber then him, else they could be as threat to his job. In turn the CTO hires someone even dumber than he is, and so on down the line. If something 'technical' comes along they hire in a 'consultant', fire him and take credit for his work. Of course any real in-house techies have to be transferred before they figure out just how stupid the CIO really is. So you end up with a business where the longest serving employee has been there less then ten months. Eventually the company goes down the tubes ...

Commentary & discussion:

Slashdot

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Full post as published by Recording Industry vs The People on April 18, 2009 (boomark / email).