The Fifty State Project

We announced earlier this month that Open States—a project covered on Opensource.com in 2011—is now being maintained by the original creators of the project, a community of Sunlight Foundation alumni and other volunteers. After a year of scant staffing culminating in the closure of Sunlight Labs, we expect that getting Open States fully operational again will take a significant effort, and we know from experience that maintaining the menagerie of scrapers into the future isn't easy either. (That's why we're looking for volunteers and donations.) So why, despite the challenges, are we taking on this project? Why do we think that Open States matters so much? And where do we plan on taking this tool going forward?...