[open-government] Defining Open Government Data?

Tue Oct 19 18:28:10 UTC 2010

No problem Tim.
-------------------------------------------
Interdependent Thoughts
Ton Zijlstra

ton at tonzijlstra.eu
+31-6-34489360

http://zylstra.org/blog
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On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 8:24 PM, Tim McNamara
<paperless at timmcnamara.co.nz>wrote:

> Fair comments, Ton. Sorry for reading over that too quickly.
>
>
>
> On 20 October 2010 07:11, Ton Zijlstra <ton.zijlstra at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Hi Tim,
>>
>> I'm not calling any public official an idiot. In fact I work with civil
>> servants a lot and have done for almost 15 years, and have yet to find one
>> who isn't passionate about public service.
>> If you read my text again you see I am calling websites idiotic and
>> crappy, which a lot of websites tend to be, the result of the sometimes
>> mysterious bureaucratic processes governments and big organizations have, as
>> well as fuzzy procurement specifications.
>>
>> best,
>>
>> Ton
>>
>> -------------------------------------------
>> Interdependent Thoughts
>> Ton Zijlstra
>>
>> ton at tonzijlstra.eu
>> +31-6-34489360
>>
>> http://zylstra.org/blog
>> -------------------------------------------
>>
>>
>> On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 8:04 PM, Tim McNamara <
>> paperless at timmcnamara.co.nz> wrote:
>>
>>> 2010/10/20 Ton Zijlstra <ton.zijlstra at gmail.com>
>>>
>>>> And maybe things like:
>>>>
>>>> every idiot/crappy gov website is polite enough to point to an Adobe
>>>> Reader download link to be able to open the PDF-muck they throw on-line.
>>>> Maybe part of the 'socially open' definition stuff should be pointing to
>>>> possible useful tools for re-use (which data.gov.uk is moving towards,
>>>> btw), such as Gridworks or viz tools that are emerging.
>>>>
>>>> But that's maybe asking too much already.
>>>>
>>>
>>> Let's act in good faith and refrain from calling officials idiots.
>>> They're professionals who are dedicated to making their country a better
>>> place. With that in mind though asking for more than a PDF is too much. Many
>>> officials struggle to understand that people want access to anything other
>>> than their PDF reports. They're entire career is built on providing
>>> excellent advice to others. Why wouldn't you want to read their advice?
>>>
>>> Moreover, by increasing the complexity that's required (more than "Export
>>> to PDF" on the part of the official), we shut lots of people out. They're
>>> too technology phobic.
>>>
>>> For example Google Refine is a good tool, but it will take years for
>>> government departments to learn about it - even though we're currently beta
>>> testing the 2.0 release. It will take a few more years before officials will
>>> be allowed to install it on their centralised desktops. I have been
>>> considering installing an instance on the Google App Engine, but don't know
>>> how much traction that will get. There are significant legal considerations
>>> for departments when they send their data offshore.
>>>
>>
>>
>
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