Dan Slee (Walsall Council) and Stuart Harrison (Lichfield District Council) and myself have compiled some arguments for open local data for people to use when faced with making the case for it.

We’ve also put together the Local Data wiki, so that this work can be continued collaboratively.

Visit Arguments for open local data

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Local council officers, bloggers and activists were brought together to help ‘generate ideas and understanding about what is needed to drive the local public data initiative at a local level’.

The release of raw data allows people to develop tools that the custodians of that data either don’t have the time, skills or remit to, or would never have dreamed of doing anyway. The Crime Statistics Quiz, for example, tests your perception of crime in your local area against the official statistics.

Releasing data also enables members of the public to point out errors, such as incorrectly mapped bus stops. This presents a good opportunity for citizens and state to work collaboratively for the the benefit of society.

Obstacles though are complex and numerous: risk aversion, personal agendas (such as job retention), concerns about quality control and fear of how the data might be used are just some of the challenges that need addressing. But challenges they are, and everyone on Monday seemed more than happy to confront them.

By the end of the day we had come up with a list of things we thought were needed (this list is from my personal notes and not the official record of the meeting):

• Data disclaimer for everyone to use;
• Clarity and guidance on the release of data;
• More clarity on ‘derived data’ (what it is, etc);
• Training;
• Repeats of this sort of workshop event;
• Business case;
• Stories of good stuff being done, that everyone can relate to, and presented accessibly;
• Research on usage and numbers;
• Budgetry incentives;
• New legislation, or better use of existing legislation, to encourage the opening up of data;
• Untangling of overlapping and seemingly contradictory legislation;
• A statutory right to data.

I have set up a blog for those involved to continue collaborating on this work: http://localdata.citizenshipfoundation.org.uk.

This post is a slightly revised version of one I posted on the Citizenship Foundation website.

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“The Open Database License (ODbL) is an open license for data and databases which includes explicit attribution and share-alike requirements.

“This license, the first of its kind, is a major step forward for open data. There are currently very few licenses available suited to data and databases and none which provide for share-alike (existing share-alike licenses such as the GPL, GFDL and CC By-SA are all unsuitable for data).”

Visit Open Database License (ODbL) v1.0 Released

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That’s great: let’s hope it also helps to nudge Ordnance Survey towards opening up their data.

Visit Local Authority Mapping Collective

• Possibly related posts

  1. Arguments for open local data
  2. Releasing local data: what are the challenges?
  3. A council might publish open data, but how does it encourage good use of that data?