Mark Headd
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mheadd.bsky.social
Mark Headd
@mheadd.bsky.social
I post about #GovernmentTech #CivicTech #ServiceDelivery #OpenData. Personal account, views expressed are all mine.
Reposted by Mark Headd
As an example of how we are building on top of Gemini 3, AI Mode in Search now uses Gemini 3 to enable new generative UI experiences, all generated completely on the fly based on your query. Here’s how you might use this to learn a complex topic like how RNA polymerase works.
November 19, 2025 at 2:58 AM
I've been thinking a lot lately about how legacy system modernization gets done in government, and about how new AI tools and development approaches can dramatically change the way we've approached this challenge in the past. spec-ops.ai
SpecOps: Specification-Driven Legacy Modernization
Specifications over code. Preserve institutional knowledge, verify behavior, and generate modern systems with AI.
spec-ops.ai
November 13, 2025 at 8:42 PM
Reposted by Mark Headd
I wrote about what @zohrankmamdani.bsky.social’s administration can do starting Day 1 to make sure NYC’s civil service and hiring system can help deliver for New Yorkers. #PublicSectorJobBoard

open.substack.com/pub/publicse...
What it will take to deliver for New Yorkers: modernize the civil service and hiring process
A special edition. Your source of tech and innovation jobs in government.
open.substack.com
November 12, 2025 at 6:30 PM
#AI coding agent instructions have evolved from simple markdown files to sophisticated orchestration frameworks in just a few. For governments, this rapid maturation offers new opportunities for collaboration that traditional code sharing never achieved. civic.io/2025/11/04/i...
Infrastructure as Code for AI: The Rapid Evolution of Agent Instructions
AI coding agent instructions have evolved from simple markdown files to sophisticated orchestration frameworks in months, not years. For government, this rapid maturation offers new opportunities f…
civic.io
November 4, 2025 at 3:34 PM
Well played, @github.com. Well played. 🎃
October 31, 2025 at 12:33 PM
Reposted by Mark Headd
This month’s Digital Benefits in the News starts with journalism telling the stories of those impacted by the federal shutdown disruption in SNAP and WIC.

Thank you to our community for all their work.

➡️ Read our full newsletter here
beeckcenter.org/4nrSKuq
Digital Benefits in the News
Sharing the latest stories across public benefits programs and digital service delivery
beeckcenter.org
October 28, 2025 at 2:12 PM
Tired: I can use AI to write software code for me.

Wired: I can use AI to improve my software code and make it more compliant with security requirements.

Inspired: I can use AI to ensure my code is compliant with security requirements from jump.

mheadd.github.io/atlas-ato-ac...
ATLAS: ATO Accelerator
ATLAS ATO Accelerator - AI-assisted generation of NIST-compliant infrastructure code to accelerate Authority to Operate timelines
mheadd.github.io
October 28, 2025 at 1:44 PM
Do you want to spend your Sunday afternoon deploying a containerized application to a local Kubernetes cluster with NIST 800-53 compliant Terraform files & then auto generate compliance documentation using an AI assistant?

I got you. mheadd.github.io/atlas-ato-ac...

#AI #ChatGPT #Claude #Copilot
ATLAS: ATO Accelerator
ATLAS ATO Accelerator - AI-assisted generation of NIST-compliant infrastructure code to accelerate Authority to Operate timelines
mheadd.github.io
October 26, 2025 at 8:31 PM
Reposted by Mark Headd
With its fusion of funk, jazz, Afrobeats and R&B, the British band conveys a radical mission to choose joy. n.pr/4hfnhtW
Kokoroko: Tiny Desk Concert
With its fusion of funk, jazz, Afrobeats and R&B, the British band conveys a radical mission to choose joy.
n.pr
October 20, 2025 at 1:18 PM
What if I told you that someday, maybe someday soon, web forms will become a legacy method for interacting with government agencies. #CivicTech

delegation.design
Design Patterns for Delegation-based Digital Services
Preparing for citizen-agent interactions in government services with thoughtful design patterns for delegation-based public interactions.
delegation.design
October 8, 2025 at 2:01 PM
How organized are your thoughts? How well can you articulate what you want to do? How clear is your vision for what you are trying to build? In the future, these are the things that will separate the good software developers from the not so good ones.

github.blog/ai-and-ml/ge...
Spec-driven development: Using Markdown as a programming language when building with AI
I coded my latest app entirely in Markdown and let GitHub Copilot compile it into Go. This resulted in cleaner specs and faster iteration.
github.blog
October 3, 2025 at 1:38 PM
Designing for delegation: How agentic digital services could transform interactions with government.

adhoc.team/2025/10/01/d...

#AI #Agent #ChatGPT #ServiceDesign #DigitalServices
Designing for delegation | Ad Hoc
Agentic, delegation-based services could reshape how people access government, cutting administrative burden – if agencies start building the right design patterns now.
adhoc.team
October 1, 2025 at 6:48 PM
Young people are reading less: literacytrust.org.uk/research-ser...

Also, reading and math scores for U.S. students continue to decline: apnews.com/article/naep...
Children and young people's reading in 2025 | National Literacy Trust
This report outlines findings from our 2025 Annual Literacy Survey, when children and young people's reading enjoyment and frequency were at an all-time low.
literacytrust.org.uk
September 10, 2025 at 3:21 PM
Reposted by Mark Headd
A beautiful stormbeach Goniatite fossil, polished by Atlantic waves.
County Clare, Ireland.
August 21, 2025 at 8:05 AM
Reposted by Mark Headd
Here. Please have a poem. I think it's lovely.
August 21, 2025 at 11:15 PM
Exciting to see the rollout of USAi.gov. GSA is already home to existing shared services like cloud.gov and Login.gov that agencies can use to accelerate development of digital services, so it makes sense to add this new shared service to the portfolio there.
USAi.gov
Accelerating trustworthy adoption of AI across the federal government. Three powerful AI tools; industry-leading models; one integrated platform.
USAi.gov
August 14, 2025 at 11:34 PM
Its been a minute (as the kids say) but there was a time in my life when I was almost exclusively focused on voice and telephony applications. I even wrote a blog for years in the aughts and early teens focused on telephony, speech recognition, and messaging apps for government. voiceingov.org
This is a copy of a website that I maintained for many years where I shared details of phone and voice-based technologies for use by governments. This site is no longer active, and the content is retained here in the hope that it will be useful to others. The source code for this website can be found on Github.
voiceingov.org
August 7, 2025 at 6:27 PM
No better welcome to a new member joining your team than an organized, properly refined backlog so that they can jump in and start contributing. Just like good documentation is a love note to your future self, a well maintained backlog is a welcome card to your new teammate.
August 7, 2025 at 12:54 PM
My friend @danmunz.bsky.social and I wrote a post about something we've been thinking about for a while - how AI will change the way people interact with governments, and also how it will change our work as civic technologists. It's the end of civic tech's "interface era." danmu.nz/blog/the-end...
The end of civic tech's interface era
Generative AI means we need to rethink the way we think about interfaces.
danmu.nz
August 7, 2025 at 12:11 PM
Reposted by Mark Headd
A few thoughts on Hierarchical Reasoning Models, an LLM-alternative we should be paying attention to, especially the civic tech world:
danmu.nz/blog/ai-thin...
Dan Munz | AI thinking, fast and slow
Hierarchical Reasoning Models have intriguing potential for the public sector, because they 'think' more like we do.
danmu.nz
August 2, 2025 at 5:03 PM
One thing that stands out in the recently issued federal AI Action Plan is the emphasis on open source AI model use. But how do government agencies actually implement these systems in ways that meet their specific needs? This post I wrote explores two key approaches.
www.linkedin.com/pulse/open-s...
Open Source AI for Government: Two Paths to Better Digital Services
How agencies can leverage the new AI Action Plan to deliver customized, secure, and cost-effective AI solutions Government agencies are at a pivotal moment in AI adoption. The recent AI Action Plan ex...
www.linkedin.com
July 26, 2025 at 2:59 PM
New blog post: The Quiet Crisis in Legacy System Modernization. civic.io/2025/06/17/t...
The Quiet Crisis in Legacy System Modernization
AI offers some new hope for tackling government legacy systems—but we can’t afford to focus only on the biggest, flashiest ones. The real crisis is quieter, deeper, and much more widespread.
civic.io
June 17, 2025 at 2:40 PM
Super important & timely analysis from MITRE regarding using LLMs to drive legacy system modernization for mission critical government systems. Huge potential, & (based on my personal experience) huge need, but they are not a panacea to the challenges governments face. www.mitre.org/sites/defaul...
www.mitre.org
June 17, 2025 at 2:11 PM
I don't know when adding emoji reactions to emails became a thing, but i am here for it.
June 12, 2025 at 7:16 PM