[od-discuss] Fwd: Help reviewing terms of use for Kenya Open data policy

Tue Nov 8 17:37:27 UTC 2011

On 13 July 2011 21:02, Ory Okolloh <ookolloh at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi all,

Hi Ory and welcome. Sorry for delay in responding. In my case at
least, this dropped off my inbox and I've only just come back to it.

> I'm new to the group.
> Was looking for help reviewing the terms of use of the Kenya govt open data
> portal:  http://opendata.go.ke/page/terms-of-service
> Any red flags? Things that need to be changed?

There is one immediate "red flag" in terms of compliance with the open
definition. For example, in section entitled Copyright it states:

<quote>
As such, and subject to any minor restrictions that may be imposed by
the law of copyright regarding the use of public information, the
Kenya ICT Board and the government agencies whose information is
provided on this website impose no restrictions to the non-commercial
reproduction, re-publication and re-distribution of any information
published on its website.
</quote>

This implies only permission for non-commercial use whereas open
definition requires that the data be freely usable for any purpose
including commercial ones.

There is some standard citation and integrity stuff in citing data section viz:

<quote>

The agency's preferred citation for each dataset is to be included in
its metadata. Users should also cite the date that data were accessed
or retrieved from www.opendata.go.ke. Finally, users must clearly
state that www.opendata.go.ke and the Kenya ICT Board cannot vouch for
the data or analyses derived from these data after the data have been
retrieved from www.opendata.go.ke.
</quote>

But that does not seem to be obviously problematic in any way.

Rufus