Jim Willis

Jim Willis is a technologist, writer, musician and community organizer. He currently lives in Red Bank, NJ with his wife and children.

He combines his love of language and understanding of technology to build social capital and lower the barrier to civic and community engagement.  He is widely recognized as being instrumental in Federal and State government adoption of open source software and believes community flourishes when it adopts the principals of Open Content, Open Services and Open Source.

Current Work:

• Chief Technology Officer, Passionato. Online classical music retailer selling DRM-free FLAC and high-bitrate MP3s.

Previous Work:

• Principal, Banyan Social Technology. Currently leads a team of software developers, new media designers and project managers to provide mission-driven organizations the skills and tools necessary to affect positive social change.

• Chief Information Officer and Director of eGovernment for the Rhode Island Office of the Secretary of State Matthew A. Brown

• Principal/Owner of eponymous consulting company specializing in data collection and analysis for public policy regarding mental health funding

Speaks/Presents:

• Internet As A Public Good Symposium - 2007 Harvard, Boston

• Romanian Open Source and Free Software Initiative - 2007 Brasov, Romania

• Federal Election Commission Best Practices for HAVA - 2006 National Science Foundation Washington, DC

• eGovernment Policy Conference- 2005 JFK School of Government-Harvard, Boston

• Open Source Code in the Public Sector - 2004 MIT and Harvard, Boston

• MySQL User Conference & Expo

• LinuxWorld-Boston

• Architecture and Infrastructure Committee, Emerging Technology Subcommittee - 2004 Washington, DC

• eGovOS Conference (2003 Conference Committee and Presenter)

• GSA’s Emerging Technology Subcommittee of the Architecture and Infrastructure Committee

• Multiple Rhode Island state and local government events

Groups/Boards:

• Founder/Publisher, Red Bank Eastside Park Neighbors Newsletter

• Technical Chair, Government Open Code Collaborative

• Co-founder, RI Web Data Sharing Committee

• Rhode Island Information Resource Management Board

• RINET-Muni Consortium

• ProvidenceGeeks

• Summit Neighborhood Association, Board Member

Writes/Blogs:

• GOCC blog

• WillisBrosBlog

• Summit Neighborhood Association

• ProvidenceGeeks

• I’m occasionally asked to contribute to magazines and other publications. Here’s a sample from Federal Computer Week

  • Resistance Is Futile

Is Written About:

• Numerous mainstream and trade media have covered my eGovernment work over the years. Here are a few of the more popular pieces.

• My eGovernment work is featured as a case study in Maria Winslow’s The Practical Manager’s Guide To Open Source.