Government asks Free Our Data to work with OPSI on web channel for users
We did say that the meeting with Michael Wills was interesting. In today’s Guardian, we precis the meeting (update: the full text is now on the blog), which boils down to a few key points:
- Michael Wills, the minister for information at the Department for Justice, thinks the case for free re-use of public sector data in and outside government is “compelling”
- He thinks that government has to move quickly to adjust to the changing information world
- He expects the ‘public task’ of Ordnance Survey to be defined within a study that will report to him by the end of this year
- the trading fund model, set up in the 1970s (by which government agencies charge for their output, reducing their need for direct tax funding) needs reexamination
- He is reluctant, however, to disturb a model (trading funds) which has produced high-quiality information
They key point though is that he wants Free Our Data to work with the Office of Public Sector information to set up a web channel through which the public can request public data, and what form they want it. That, to us, marks a significant recognition of the importance of this campaign.
Read more at The minister will hear you now in the Guardian. The full transcript of the meeting will be posted once it has been re-checked for accuracy.
- The following posts may be related...(the database guesses):
- OPSI opens web channel where you can ask for government data (20 September 2007; score: 72.79%)
- A chance to tell OPSI what we want (4 January 2008; score: 68.28%)
- And now, OPSI sets up an "unlock that data" channel (7 July 2008; score: 43.01%)
- |In Thursday's Guardian: want to know where post offices are? Sorry, we can't (or won't) tell yoyu (13 October 2007; score: 33.67%)
- Fun facts from the DCLG / OS consultation (29 December 2009; score: 32.47%)
July 27th, 2007 at 11:55 am
With regard to the last two bullet from the meeting summary, the OS only became a trading fund in the 1990s (1998 I think), not the 1970s and we have had high-quality mapping in the UK from the 19th century, so that argument falls.
July 27th, 2007 at 12:01 pm
…we need a model that continues to produce high quality data, which is affordable and accessible…just another example…
http://www.whoownsscotland.org.uk/os.htm
July 29th, 2007 at 6:21 pm
Bruce you’re quite right about OS of course, but I understood the minister to be talking about the trading fund model as a whole. That does date from the Heath government.
August 1st, 2007 at 7:17 am
However, if we are discussing the origins of the trading fund model in the 1970’s, the discussion then becomes one of obsolescence and irretrievable loss of value. Trading funds are, in many ways, the buggy whips of a digital information age, outdated and essentially unsound. A digital knowledge economy was unknown in the ’70’s.
One thing that I continue to note is the ‘quality data’ card is always played as an example of why a trading fund like Ordnance Survey should be maintained. OS has lobbied well, I can see. However, even that argument no longer holds water. In this day of digital Openness (i.e. open source, open standards, open data files etc.), quality can be achieved through universal participation in the product outcome. The human genome was sequenced through open processes. It would be great if one of the scientists involved in that project might write in here.
I do hope the minister and the Treasury people realise that this issue of data quality, is yet another red herring.
August 26th, 2007 at 1:11 pm
Our site (’Walk highlands’) wanted to licence digital data from the OS to provide the mapping for free online walking routes (helping to boost tourism in rural areas).
To buy the licence for the digital data would cost over £20,000 per year, but the OS will allow us to buy a different so-called ‘paper’ licence and scan all the maps in ourselves at a cost of £50 per year – a saving of 99.75%, and still display them on the web in the same way. This means our website has visible ‘creases’ on its maps, and takes us alot of time, but otherwise gives the same result, and we could hire graphic artists to remove the creases at a much lower cost. It seems a real anomaly that the ‘means’ by which you put maps on a site determines the cost, rather than the end result of what maps are provided and for what purpose.
Here’s hoping this review means we can put digital maps on the site next year – and save ourselves months of effort in manual scanning.
August 30th, 2007 at 9:56 pm
[...] This will seem really strange, but tipped off by a comment on this blog from Walkhighlands, we investigated further. And it turns out to be true: with an Ordnance Survey “paper licence”, you can scan maps and put them online as you like. [...]
October 11th, 2007 at 1:57 pm
“They key point though is that he wants Free Our Data to work with the Office of Public Sector information to set up a web channel through which the public can request public data, and what form they want it.”
So far as I can see the channel is the OPSI PSI Re-use Request Forum. It needs to be publicised.
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/forums/forums/forum.asp?forumid=8