The information technology helps making the government services more available to the public. By means of the Internet, public information and public services may for example be made more easily accessible regardless of time and place. It is important for the public administration to make use of the new electronic information services in a systematic and simple way, thus giving the public a better access to information of their administration bodies. The national government administration possesses large quantities of information that may be easily accessed electronically, and free of charge, giving extended possibilities of obtaining material on matters of interest. By presenting public information on the Internet, the availability is good, retrieval is easy, and contextual relations are obtained by the linking to other documents.
Electronic publishing is thus both efficient and cheap.
The purpose of the ODIN is, in accordance with this, to make information and news from the government and the ministries available electronically on the Internet. Our aim is to use modern information technology to make central government services more open and accessible. In line with the Norwegian public price policy, using the ODIN shall be a service free of charge. The organization is guided by an editorial board who sets the guide-lines and to whom the editorial staff reports. The board is headed by the Ministry of National Planning and Coordination, the other members represent other ministries.