[open-government] G8 sign up to Open Data by default!

Tue Jun 18 19:36:10 UTC 2013

Not sure if you've heard, but the G8 has just signed up to the Open Data
Charter:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/open-data-charter

Among other things, this commits the members to open data by default,
requires national open data action plans and includes a list of 'example
datasets', including company registers.

On Saturday, at the official G8 Trade, Tax and Transparency event, the
World Bank's Managing Director, Carolyn Anstys, also launched the Open
Company Data Index <http://registries.opencorporates.com/> in partnership
with OpenCorporates, to promote the opening of company registers around the
world. So in both these areas, I think real progress is being made.

Hopefully those who've been campaigning for open data (particularly open
company data) in the G8 countries but hitting a brick wall should now have
some more power to bring it about.

Thanks to the UK G8 team, especially the Cabinet Office.

Chris Taggart
Co-founder
-------------------------------------------------------
OpenCorporates :: The Open Database of the Corporate World
http://opencorporates.com
Blog: http://blog.opencorporates.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/OpenCorporates

OpenCorporates is published by Chrinon Ltd, a company dedicated to
improving and publishing public data under an open licence that allows and
encourages reuse, including commercially. Registered in England, number
07444723.
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