Code4Country Generates News Apps for Open Goverment; Winners Announced in Moscow and Washington D.C.

(Sept. 24-25, Moscow and Washington, D.C.) Code4Country, the first ever simultaneous U.S./Russian programmers' marathon, took place last weekend in Moscow and Washington, D.C.

A joint effort between USAID, the U.S. State Dept., Google, American University, Cisco Systems, Yandex, and the Skolkovo Foundation, the event brought together volunteer programmers and civil society experts to work on technical solutions to issues of openness and accountability in government.

In Moscow, first prize went to a cell phone application called Fraudless E-Vote, which allows voters to track ballots by simply photographing a bar code printed on each ballot. Dr. Mikhail Fedotov, Russia's presidential advisor on human rights and civil society, addressed the coders at the opening in Moscow. "The challenges which you will be working on today have been contributed by the citizens of our two countries," he said. "Now it's up to you to put your talent and creativity to work to solve them."

The coders broke into teams, and after 30 hours of coding they presented their ideas to a panel of judges consisting of representatives from both civil society and the private sector.

The two locations were linked via live video simulcast throughout the weekend; teams working on similar challenges connected with each other through this link as well as via Skype and email to learn about each other's approaches.

Second prize in Moscow went to a visualization app for government procurement and spending data, while third prize was awarded to a program which tracks the assets and incomes of public officials (built in response to a challenge from Transparency International.)

USAID/Russia Mission Director Charles North, Skolkovo Foundation's Bram Caplan, and State Duma Deputy Ilya Ponamarov gave closing comments following the award ceremony.

In Washington D.C., the winner was an open search tool which connects citizens to legislation relevant to their interests; USAID's Deputy Assistant Administrator for Europe and Eurasia, Jonathan Hale, distributed the awards and thanked the coders for participating in this unique collaboration between technologists and civil society.

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