[open-government] Fwd: Invitation to Participate: Demand-driven Open Data

Mon Apr 15 21:26:48 UTC 2013

There's no harm in collecting more perspectives on the utility of open
data, I suppose, and characterizing it more fully is something we spend
quite a bit of time thinking about at Sunlight.

I do think there's probably a limit to how far a survey can reveal the ways
in which open data are used, though, since so many of those uses are
invisible. I confess I rarely think about how the remodeling of the grocery
store down the block from my apartment was informed by open data, but I'd
be shocked if Census information wasn't consulted by Giant Foods as they
considered the investment. And in the financial realm, the benefits to a
liquid and panic-free financial system (well, such as it is) are so diffuse
that I'm sure almost no one regularly connects them to the SEC, FINRA,
FDIC, BLS and all of the other collectors and sometime-distributors of open
data that keep the system running.

Much of this *is* incredibly boring data, of course, but also vitally
important. I think Tom's point about FOIA is well-taken, but more broadly
many of the most important users of data will be institutions, not
individuals. It can be helpful to highlight individual-user-level
applications when telling a story about why open data is important (we
built Sitegeist for just this reason) but I worry that many of them amount
to relatively unimportant consumer experiences -- checking the weather or
bus schedule, stuff like that.

On Mon, Apr 15, 2013 at 4:22 PM, Tom Steinberg <director at mysociety.org>wrote:

> I really don't like this narrative that says there is a failure of demand
> for government information, and I don't think it should be allowed to sail
> past unquestioned.
>
> Evidence :
> * both Blair and Cameron publicly lament the impact of FoIA, because the
> demand creates a burden
> * foi-released data on WhatDoTheyKnow.com is now accessed about 320,000
> times (visits) a month, in the UK alone.
>
> What there is no demand for is rubbish boring data nobody asked for.
>
> Tom
>  On 15 Apr 2013 17:07, "Jonathan Gray" <jonathan.gray at okfn.org> wrote:
>
>> FYI
>>
>> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
>>
>> Dear all,
>>
>> While much progress has been made on the supply side of Open Data, more
>> remains to be done, particularly regarding the demand side of Open Data.
>>
>> With the objective of advancing and improving current efforts regarding
>> the demand side of Open Data, the World Bank Open Finances and the World
>> Bank Institute's Open Government teams are conducting a survey that seeks
>> to shed some light on key aspects of this subject.
>>
>> We would be most grateful if you could contribute to this work by
>> completing this very brief survey: bit.ly/OpenDataDemand<http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fbit.ly%2FOpenDataDemand&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNE7HJdm24NIlEx6-SLLfB97G5k25g> and
>> by sharing this survey with your networks so that as many interested
>> people have the opportunity to respond.
>>
>> The survey will take just 5-10 minutes to complete, and all findings as
>> well as any insights gathered from this survey will be shared with all of
>> you in the hopes that they can be useful for future collaborative efforts
>> to enhance engagement around Open Data.
>>
>> Also, please join the on-going conversation about the survey on Twitter
>> by using #OpenDataDemand<https://twitter.com/search?q=opendatademand&src=typd>
>> .
>>
>> If you have any questions, comments, or feedback of any kind, please do
>> not hesitate to let Sam Lee (CC'ed) and I know.
>>
>> All the best,
>>
>> Felipe
>>
>> Felipe Estefan
>> Open Government
>> The World Bank
>> +1 (315) 420-7464
>> @FelipeEstefan <https://twitter.com/felipeestefan>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Jonathan Gray <http://jonathangray.org/> | @jwyg<http://twitter.com/jwyg>
>> Director of Policy and Ideas
>> The Open Knowledge Foundation <http://okfn.org/> | @okfn<http://twitter.com/okfn>
>> Support our work: okfn.org/support
>>
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