I attended a very interesting Barcamp on Saturday (BarcampUkGovWeb09 is it’s full title) which was put on for people who worked in or around the government through the web (I was there representing my company Zaizi).
There were several interesting talks about Twitter (focused on how some government departments are using it as a broadcast tool) and interesting discussion around consultations (I now know how to find consultations online, should I choose to do so). The most interesting talk I attended was on Open Data. Now this is obviously quite a broad subject but the heart of the session discussions were around how developers could use data that the government has to create mashups and the like. Any government has an incredible (and growing) amount of data (some useful, some not) sitting around ‘collecting dust’. As a developer and innovator I see lots of useful ways this data could be used to improve lives, save money, etc etc. For most people it isn’t such a great leap to see how crime data could be (and has been) plotted on a map (I’ve been told that when this was done in the US, crime was reduced because people in high crime areas did something about it). There were several discussions from both those inside government and those outside about the difficulties putting data online, trying to make sure it was in the right format and trying to get the licencing right (and there are some very good initiatives in this area). Of course there was the usual Postcode -> Latlong flamewar (help out here) which is always humourous.
Currently a big problem is that the government departments don’t have the resources to put all data online. And they’re not sure which data is useful and which is not. On the other side the developers don’t know what data is there! What about if we re-frame the issue.
What is the cost to the economy if the data is not made available. What would stop it being a legal requirement to publish all (non-sensitive) data to a web service? Cost of course, but think of the economic gain. Local and national innovation. A massive step up for the web industry. A chance to harvest all the data for the good of our country. One would be a fool to seriously suggest making it mandatory but there are definite benefits to this approach.
Let’s commit to Opening our Data and, as a nation (and as a world), reap the benefits.
