Can Obama bring tech respect to Washington?

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Speaker: I'm excited about the change that's coming to Washington under the Obama Administration. Sure, the economy, the war, the rampant good old boy politics - there's hope that so many things will be different in the coming years. But that's not the change I'm talking about. For too long, Washington has been plagued with this nose-raising attitude toward technology, the precious Blackberry being the exception, of course. But now, we're getting a President who understands the value of mainstream and cutting-edge technology. After all, this is the candidate who reached a whole new generation of voters via MySpace, Facebook, and Twitter. This is the President who will reluctantly give up his Blackberry to keep aids from worrying about compliance with the Presidential Records Act. This is the President who is shooting to be first with a laptop computer on his West Wing desk. This is the President who will broadcast a weekly address not only over the radio, but also on YouTube. There's still two months to go before Mr. Obama takes the oath of office, but already, one of the hottest topics in the blogosphere is who will be appointed the nations first Chief Technology Officer? There are no details yet about the federal CTO position, but one thing's for sure. The fact that Americans have a President who is engaged with technology offers hope that the next four years will feel more like the 21st Century than the last eight years did.

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