[@OKFNau] Open Data Index 2014

Tue Dec 23 07:16:12 UTC 2014

Hi Paul,
  Thanks for bringing this up. IMOH, the mix of datasets that make up the
index could be improved. The census tries to cover both transparency (open
government) and utility/service data, which makes a weird mix.

* National map: a single shapefile - how does this make the top 10
important datasets, in a world of OpenStreetMap? Seems a bit ridiculous.
* Government Budget: hooray for Pia!
* Election Results: a worthy inclusion, and genuinely reflects well on
Australia
* National Statistics: a service-oriented dataset, useful but hard to
define. The ABS data is notoriously hard to work with directly, which is
why companies like id.com.au exist as resellers. Still, the fact that the
ABS provides (almost?) all of their data free of charge is worth
celebrating.
* Postcodes: seems out of place in the top 10 (perhaps related to a
previous fight in the UK for this data). Street addresses would be far more
useful, and are the #1 and #2 most requested datasets on data.gov.au:
https://datagovau.ideascale.com/a/index
* Government spending: Ok. Would be great to have political donations in
the list.
* Company register: I'm ambivalent. Is it so important?
* Pollutant emissions: A couple of environmental contacts have been pretty
skeptical of the value of NPI data, but good I guess.
* Transport Timetables: This is a weird category to have in a national
census, and I feel like Australia is getting points a bit too easily here.
Countries like France or Germany have nationalised (and
internationally-connected) systems with the time of every train leaving at
any of thousands of stations around the country - and it's all available
online. We have a bunch of different websites for every different
"national" train line with its own independent way of presenting
non-machine-readable data (some of which seems to be offline:
http://www.queenslandrailtravel.com.au/RailServices/Pages/TheInlander-Westboundtimetable.aspx
, http://www.thegulflander.com.au/) - and we still get 45%? There's not
even a centralised dataset to speak of, it's just a bunch of independent
companies that happen to provide similar information, in non-standardised
ways.
* Legislation: a worthy inclusion, but it seems a bit arbitrary to include
Legislation, but not parliamentary debate (Hansard) or court proceedings
(AustLII).

Steve

On Thu, Dec 18, 2014 at 11:10 PM, Paul Walsh <paulywalsh at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I just realised that there was no announcement on this list for the
> release of the Open Data Index (was last week).
>
> The Index is here:
>
> http://index.okfn.org
>
> Australia’s performance is here:
>
> http://index.okfn.org/place/australia/
>
> Or, relative to other places in the Index:
>
> http://index.okfn.org/place/
>
> Australia improved rank in the Index this year, and I think it is
> important that the open data community on the list is aware of the data :).
>
> I developed the new Index site, so if anyone has any questions feel free.
>
> Best,
>
> Paul
>
>
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