[javaun]

I spent 7 years in Washington and can attest the change has been incredible. Civic-minded hackers, non-profits, and startups went from being outsiders to permeating agencies. Much was organic, and some was top-down mandated. Obama saw what happened in 2 elections and these new agencies are peppered with the people that used agile tech to great advantage on the campaign. Agencies like HHS and FCC were pioneers in open data -- not just for government, but for anyone. Look at cfpb.gov - an example of what an agency can look like when it starts from scratch. 18F and USDS are now tasked with bringing that innovation to the rest of government. If you can get to DC, consider attending the Sunlight Foundation's transparencycamp.org this May. It's the biggest event of it's kind, bringing 600 folks from across the globe.

EDIT: changed this sentence: "Much was organic and some top-down mandated" to reflect what I think was mostly due to popular upswell, though there were key executive decisions. The O'Reilly network has a lot of influential folks in DC too.