@Sing - I am just puzzled why the meeting would not be easily accessible for people to watch by just going to the government’s website and clicking ...
My other gripe is that it is hit or miss, if I get an e-mail about these meetings...
@Wally, I couldn't agree more and it is *not* intuitive to access the proceedings. However, I may be able to provide a bit of insight after working in similar environments (NSF, USAID) for some years now to provide communications channels to the public.
Short answer
I'd wager a bet that some harried staffer or contractor didn't set up some campaign/link correctly somewhere. This probably doesn't offer you any more information than what you've already surmised.
Long answer
How hard can't it be? Why can't agencies and government entities get it together when sharing their findings around costly and time-intensive projects?
A large part of this is due to the simple nature of very, very inefficient government contracting. The agencies/bureaus are most concerned with their primary missions (or, at best, the dedicated bureaucrats/civil servants employed therein who make it their "life work" in these settings). So, at NIH, they're most concerned about the science/medicine.
Now, presenting that stuff
out to the public (through public affairs) becomes secondary. It's not the agencies primary reason for existence.
There's also a
flood of content/findings that come through. Every single researcher/project is convinced that
their project is the most important work being done. An efficient agency sets priorities and sticks to them, routing and elevating key priorities. IMHO, there is no "efficient government agency," the term is oxymoronic.
To summarize the paragraphs above, often the people at the top of the pyramid don't set consistent, clear, immutable objectives for their staff; much less clear marching orders.
And then administrations change and an entire agency may have to "pivot" for political expediency. An
agency cannot pivot. Rather, it begins a large, clumsy, unwieldy turn that--if lucky--may be nearing completion when a new president is elected. At that time, an agency may receive an entirely new mandate. Wash, rinse, repeat.
Then you have "beltway bandits," government contractors, whose primary business is winning government bids. In my experience, there is no "go-to" for multimedia and communication solutions among agencies; rather, there it's an organic environment that some winning contractors may handle in-house and some other winning-contractors
may then bid out to a sub-contractor. And there are different parameters/requirements
for every bid.
Depending on how a contract is fulfilled, it will either be clean, elegant, and usable for the term of the contract (and, ideally, beyond, if it's future-proofed). And a smart contracting officer/staff will build on prior procurements to expand its capabilities.
Unfortunately, at least in my experience, that rarely happens. Because, by design, agencies do *not* staff/fund for this capability, that fact, coupled with the rapid rate of change with technological tools (web, AV, multimedia, etc.), leads to a constant churn it what's used and the tools used to share/present information to the public.
If you're still with me, I'll now backtrack -- the phone has been around as a communication channel for over 140 years. Outside of a hiccup here or there given staff and contracting turnover, there is no reasonable explanation or "answer" as to why a group or agency cannot painlessly make a teleconference available to the general public and, then, share out all other resources presented via email.
