April Fools!

As you know, Sunlight Labs has never been a fan of the Content Management System— we think that overall, they’re too clunky and get in the way of an organization’s real objective. Putting content online. We started asking ourselves– is there an easier way? Could we figure out a more agile, nimble way to do things.

We started asking around to customers. A lot of folks said they didn’t like all the typing, copying and pasting that came with using a content management system. Others said that they could never figure out django because they didn’t understand why a snake had to be involved in the first place.

After literally days of hard work, we found the right solution: Paper. What if people could write content on paper. Or type content on their computers, print it out, and then submit the scanned images of their content on paper. Everybody knows how to use paper. Everybody can read paper. It’s the perfect solution. But how do we get paper… online.

To solve this problem, we created the MultiFax Network Content Management System (MFNCMS)– it works with twilio, asterisk, and the Bain 5000. Now our teams don’t need to worry about submitting things through digital forms anymore. They can simply use their computers to research and write articles. Then they can print them out, and get all the editorial input they need. Finally, to submit their articles, they just fax a unique phone line and extension that matches the submitting user’s username online.

In addition, using the MFNCMS, our intellectual property is finally protected. On the server-side the MFNCMS uses a technology called “.bmp” to automatically protect the content of our blog posts and our data. With .bmp, we no longer have to worry about being taken out of context, or citation without recognition of our hard work.

We’re really excited to bring you MFNCMS. While citizens may never need to use it, it’s potential for use in government is a huge deal. That’s why we’re partnering with Tartsmonix and Flooz Ballen Tamilton to bring government agencies this unique (patent pending) technology just in time for the Open Government Directive.