The final report from the BC Services Card User Panel has been released. This is the panel I was selected to be part of and which met late last year – a cross-section of citizens assembled to learn about the various technologies, options and potential goals of the new BC Services Card, and to make recommendations on how the government should proceed, what uses they should fast-track, and what they should go slow on or hold back entirely. The panel was one component of a larger consultation that included a panel of technology experts, and a public input survey. Here is the final report and here’s the main website about the consultation. My bio is on page 17. I also had a fairly significant hand in the wording of the summary that starts on page 24. The experience was a very interesting one. I really felt I was fulfilling my “civic duty” and at the same time getting to really dig into some areas of great interest to me: technology, the internet, privacy and online security issues. And, I got to meet some interesting folks from all over the province who were similarly engaged and interested. In the end there was a lot of consensus over the fairly limited initial areas into which the card’s use could be extended. I can’t summarize here but the report is definitely worth a look.