[okfn-advisory] fund-raising idea for OKF

Sat Dec 5 18:31:32 UTC 2009

This sounds like an excellent idea and (in my opinion) something that
the OKF would definitely be interest in pursuing in principle. The
main problem from a logistical point of view is our capacity. We have
a huge amount on our plate at the moment and to me it looks like
Peter's proposals would require several weeks of person time to get
started.

*However* - I think there's one possibility here in the near future,
which is that we apply to CODATA's recent CFP for new Task Groups [1]
with preliminary work (scoping, networking, basic report?) on this as
one of our objectives. This would give us a small budget to help get
the ball rolling. In order for this to work, I think we'd really need
backing (i.e. support, not necessarily time) from scientifically
orientated Advisory Board Members (Tim Hubbard, John Wilbanks, Peter
Suber, Peter Murray-Rust, ...) - as well as suggestions for other
groups/individuals who might join the Task Group ASAP. I would suggest
that the Working Group in Open Data in Science [2] could take
responsibility for this.

What to people think?

Jonathan

[1] http://www.codata.org/New%20TG%20Call%20letter.doc
[2] http://wiki.okfn.org/wg/science

On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 6:05 PM, John Wilbanks
<wilbanks at creativecommons.org> wrote:
> It's hard work, I can tell you from experience :-)
>
> The main thing is to work on getting data into existing registries at EBI,
> EMBL, NIH, and so forth. Otherwise you're stuck in a world where you're
> having to store, serve, and support data. Creative Commons has spent an
> enormous amount of time on this topic and we're starting to have real
> success. Merck's donation of data to Sage and some more forthcoming work
> from other top-ten global pharma will both fall into these lines - there's
> an org dedicated to serving the data, our job is just making sure the data
> falls into the public domain so that it can be reused, redistributed, and
> re-integrated.
>
> jtw
>
> Peter Suber wrote:
>>
>>  Just one quick follow-up to Peter MR:
>>
>> On Sat, Dec 5, 2009 at 4:35 AM, Peter Murray-Rust <pm286 at cam.ac.uk
>> <mailto:pm286 at cam.ac.uk>> wrote:
>>
>>    [...]
>>    On Fri, Dec 4, 2009 at 7:04 PM, Peter Suber <peter.suber at gmail.com
>>    <mailto:peter.suber at gmail.com>> wrote:
>>
>>
>>        First, OKF could launch a project on the "pre-competitive
>>        sharing" of pharma data.  It could collect info on the company
>>        initiatives already under way, develop guidelines for other
>>        companies, and so on. This much seems very compatible with the
>>        current OKF mission.  Call it Phase 1.
>>
>>         I agree with this - it's obviously considerable work and I am
>>    wondering whether there is synergy with other bodies. I suecpt that
>>    we would need some funding for this.
>>
>>
>> Much of the info on existing initiatives I've already collected in my
>> blog.  It would have to be rounded out and brought up to date.  But that
>> phase of the project wouldn't have to start from scratch.
>>
>>     Peter (Suber)
>>
>>
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>
> --
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------
> John Wilbanks
>
> VP for Science, Creative Commons
> http://creativecommons.org
> http://sciencecommons.org
> http://neurocommons.org
>
> "We make sharing easy, legal, and scalable."
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>
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-- 
Jonathan Gray

Community Coordinator
The Open Knowledge Foundation
http://www.okfn.org