Category: Data Policy

Categories
Data Policy opensource Thoughts

StateoftheMap 2009 Call for Papers

The call for papers for always one of the most interesting conference has just been announced. StateoftheMap 2009 is the conference to discuss all thinks to do with the ground breaking Open Street Map Project, and this year will be held in Amsterdam in July

This is much more than a gathering of people who like to ride bikes with GPS tapped to their handlebars however, the conference is a excellent forum for discussions of new types of cartography, data access policy and legal issues around open source data.

Indeed this year I’m sure one of the hottest topics will be licensing of data, not something which appears to everybody, but its an indication that the project has reached a level of maturity that it needs to be addressed.

Written and submitted from the 11:45 London-Cardiff Train, near Bristol.

Categories
Data Policy Google Maps Transport

Transport for London boards the mash-up bandwagon

tflkml

As introduced by Christopher Osborne @osbornec on Twitter this morning (where else do you get news these days ?), Transport for London (TfL) the government organisation responsible for most transport in London have begun providing access to limited amounts of their transit data, via a simple web feed interface.

TfL must be congratulated for this step, and by doing so using simple XML feeds including using KML for station locations. Contrast this with the route often taken to build complex (and expensive) web portals and online ordering systems for data.

Of course the missing piece which would be of great value to many developers, Google included, would be the schedule information for the Buses, Tubes and Trams that TfL runs. This information is widely available in the US and in some other European cities and is behind the transit feature of Google Maps.

Still a great step forward, and an example for others to follow !

Written and submitted from the Google Office, Dublin.

Categories
Data Policy Google Earth

History in Google Earth – Did you miss it ?

With last months launch of Google Earth 5.0 much “mainstream” interest was focused on the capability to view under the ocean, and of course to begin the search for the lost city of Atlantis 🙂

For many however, myself included, the most important new capability is the ability to view historic images from the Google archive of satellite and aerial imagery.

 

Wembley Stadium 1997-2007
Wembley Stadium 1997-2007

Early days of course, but the potential to view history in this way has massive potential as illustrated by this image of Wembley Stadium in London. As you can imagine the back office system needed to deliver this are substantial, but the limiting factor remains access to imagery from around the world. 

As to be expected by now the greatest availability is in the United States where the enlightened federal data policy means that it is possible to view Mountain View Ca. from the late 1940s — fantastic for viewing the development of the city from farmland to Silicon Valley.

Similar imagery of course was acquired at the same time in Europe, if would be wonderful to see it also made available..

 

Written and submitted from the Fira Exhibition Centre, Barcelona, using its public wifi network

Categories
Data Policy Google Maps

Mapping the Victorian fires – Some important lessons for Europe ?

Nobody can have failed to be moved by the tragedy of the Bush fires which have been devastating Victoria, Australia this weekend. As reported by Official Google Australia Blog the Google Geo team in Sydney worked fast yesterday to get a real-time map of the extent of the fires available online and is has seen extensive use over the last 24 hours.

victoriafires

A crucial part to making this happen beyond the skill and dedication of the Google team in Sydney, has been the system put in place by State of Victoria Country Fire Authority (CFA). This largely volunteer fire brigade have put in place an excellent web based system including a RSS feed of incidents which is used to produce the map.

This is a great example for all public sector providers of information.. provide your information in a form that allows reuse via different channels, not only does this spread the flow of information to as wide an audience as possible, it also reduces the direct traffic to your site during major events.

And for UK readers it is interesting to note that although protected by our familiar friend Copyright, these feeds are available and indeed designed for personal and non-commercial use. 

Written and submitted from the Google Office, London.

Categories
Data Policy

Just brilliant @uk_trains

Bus park

Blogger at the excellent Mobile Industry Review, Ben Smith has developed one of the most useful services to emerge from the event that will become known to many as #uksnow.

UK trains is a BBC Backstage powered mash-up which sends travel update information from all the UK Train Operating companies to dedicated twitter feeds, so for me to find out if my train to work in running I just need to follow @uktr_southwest.

uktrains

This morning most of the official web sources of public transport information failed under the weight of traffic, which just highlights, as Ben points out the, the value of publishing transport information via as many online channels as possible.

It would be great for example to be able to offer transit information for London of Google Maps as happens in New York or Chicago, perhaps fellow Londoners you might ask Transport for London why this is not possible ?

 

Written and submitted from home, using my home 802.11 network.

Categories
Data Policy Ordnance Survey

Power of Information Taskforce – Homework for the OS

The influential Power of Information task force,  the group working within the Cabinet Office to suggest better ways of using Government Information has published their interim report back to government in a “wiki-like” form to allow comments from the community before final publication.

As any reader of this blog will expect, there is considerable discussion of the potential value and problems associated with  access to geospatial data in the UK. 

The report make a number of recommendations which don’t really appear to be that radical,  and are not a million miles away from suggestions I have made in the past, lets hope the influence of the cabinet office can move policy in Southampton with more success.

Here are the recommendations themselves..

▪ Basic geographic data such as electoral and administrative boundaries, the location of public buildings, etc. should be available free of charge to all.

▪ There should be simple, free access to general mapping and address data for modest levels of use by any user

▪ Voluntary and community organisations pursuing public policy objects should benefit from straightforward standard provisions for ensuring access to geospatial data at all levels of use

▪ Licensing conditions should be simplified and standardised across the board and, for all but the heaviest levels of use, should be on standard terms and conditions and should not depend on the intended use or the intended business model of the user.

▪ The OpenSpace API, similar to but currently a constrained version of Google Maps should become the primary delivery point for the Ordnance Survey’s services

Although not a recommendation in itself, clearly a key point remains the OS view of derived data, and it viral effect on the creation of geospatial data in the UK, the current situation where even the smallest use of OS mapping in locating a new feature on a map results in the OS claiming IP on the whole map cannot continue.

Overall the report itself and the process by which it has been created are a great example of how Government can really make use of “web 2.0” approaches to change how policy is developed, discussed and communicated.

Written and submitted from home, using my home 802.11 network.

Categories
Data Policy Thoughts

Government forced to more openness

A brilliant result for mySociety and all who support openness in government, I guess that includes President Obama.

“And those of us who manage the public’s dollars will be held to account – to spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day – because only then can we restore the vital trust between a people and their government.”

Today the UK Government shelved plans to exclude MP’s expenses from the Freedom of Information Act, a result of an active online campaign and the resulting loss of cross party support.

As Tom points out, this is a real example of the potential of citizen power in the age of the internet.

Great Stuff, and huge kudos to mySociety.

Written and submitted from home, using my home 802.11 network.

Categories
Data Policy Thoughts

Set the boundaries free

An excellent post by Richard Allan on the Power of Information blog, Geographic Data that Should be Free (In All Senses of the Word).

As the post points out there could be a very simple solution to the current problem with OS derived data, make certain types of geospatial data including administrative boundaries and the locations of public services free . 

This would have a very minor impact on the revenue of the OS, the real “cash cow” for the OS is its large scale Mastermap data, it could almost give away all it’s other data products and not really notice the difference.

Written and submitted from a First Great Western Train, near Reading using my Three 3G modem.

Categories
Data Policy Ordnance Survey Thoughts

A change of direction for the OS ?

From todays Pre-Budget report, a document that’s main focus is the fiscal stimulation of the UK economy, this nugget of potentially very exciting news…

“4.54 Re-use of public sector information from trading funds 

The HM Treasury/Shareholder Executive assessment of trading funds has considered the potential for innovation and growth from increasing commercial and other use of public sector information. It will shortly publish some key principles for the re-use of this information, consider how these currently apply in each of the trading funds and how they might apply in the future, and the role of the Office of Public Sector Information in ensuring that Government policy is fully reflected in practice.

For the Ordnance Survey, this will involve consideration of its underlying business model. Further details will be announced in Budget 2009.”

In politics, timing is everything..

Written and submitted from home, using my home 802.11 network.

Categories
Data Policy OS Research Thoughts

Notes from down-under

As the Whitehall farce that is the OS derived data debacle continues, it’s interesting to contrast the flow of public sector information in the UK with that in Australia which I have just experienced first hand at the first Asia Pacific Spatial Innovation Conference.

Interestingly for a Geospatial conference there was in addition to the usual technology developments, a theme looking at innovation in business models, funding and licensing. It’s not often there are as many economists at a geospatial conference as ESRI gurus !

For me the biggest take away was the increasing recognition by government here that data needs to be set free both at all levels of government, and there are I’m sure many important lessons which could be picked up in Europe and in the UK specifically. 


Australia is more similar to the UK than the US, for example the value of information is recognised and information products are protected by copyright as is the case in the UK.

But in Australia, lead by the great example of Queensland, government data sets are starting to be released using Creative Commons licenses, and in a study presented by Tim Barker the Director of Queensland’s Spatial Information Office, 85% of the public sector data-sets they had examined could by licensed using one of the standard creative commons licenses without any problems.

Before you all fall about laughing saying this could never happen in the UK, the OS actually has released information under a creative commons license before, the research team published some ontologies used in semantic research using a non-commercial share alike licence, but of course perhaps that was a little under the radar screen.

Still we live in hope…

Written and submitted from the Qantas Lounge, Sydney AIrport, using its free 802.11 network.