[wdmmg-discuss] Does anyone have any thoughts for this post on open data?

[K Corrick]

Cool.
Thanks Dan, thanks Francis. Really helpful. I'm also getting my head around
the issues so this is just good for me too. This technocratic argument is
one that I can see becoming wider, and it's a tempting one to hold to in
this area, as it has an air of intellectual rigour about it. However, I can
also see that potentially what Dan is saying is that there needs to be
people who bridge the gap between the raw messy data and helping people to
understand, interpret, use and create tools that make it useful, as well as
the areas that Rufus, Dan and Francis have highlighted, which is clearly
what WDMMG is doing.

I've invited Dan McQuillan to the Hacks and Hackers event that Rufus and
Becky are speaking at for the Online News Association on 13 July
http://onajulymeetup.eventbrite.com/ (all welcome), as I know him quite
well.

Meanwhile... and separately, I've got meetings with Tim Bradshaw at the FT
and Emma Mulqueeny set up for the next few weeks, and will be setting others
up too. Any thoughts most welcome. Will also send separate update with links
of where I'm at.

Kathryn
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On Mon, Jun 21, 2010 at 12:19 PM, Dan Brickley <danbri at danbri.org> wrote:

> On Mon, Jun 21, 2010 at 11:56 AM, K Corrick
> <kathryn.corrick at googlemail.com> wrote:
> > Hello,
> > This article by Dan McQuillan:
> >
> > Open data doesn't empower communities
> >
> > http://www.internetartizans.co.uk/open_data_does_not_empower
> > "Open data doesn't empower communities. I'm not saying open data is a bad
> > thing, but we need to highlight the gap between the semantic web and
> social
> > impact. Otherwise we'll continue to get swept along on a tide of
> > technocratic enthusiasm where hope lies in 'a flood of data to create a
> > data-literate citizenry'...."
> > Its currently getting a lot of attention on Twitter and some interesting
> > feeback. I was just wondering if anyone from the WDMMG team like to post
> a
> > comment to give our take on what he's saying?
>
> It has some affinity with Lessig's more detailed "against
> transparency" (
> http://www.hyperorg.com/blogger/2009/10/12/lessigs-against-transparency-a-walkthrough/
> http://www.tnr.com/article/books-and-arts/against-transparency?page=0,0
> )
>
> The post strikes me as a recycled-in-radical-dress version of the
> technocrat objection to openness, ie. that the masses couldn't really
> understand this stuff anyway, and that any attempt to make bulky raw
> data accessible necessarily introduces perspective and distortion, so
> better to leave such things in the hands of professionals.
>
> The simplest answer is modesty, to note that open data (of all
> flavours, not just govt) is only part of the path towards helping
> people understand the world around them. Some understanding will come
> from raw facts, more may come from eg. video and documentary
> materials. In RDF terms, triples are a means to an end not an end in
> themselves.
>
> If visualisations of the raw data can be embedded in eg. blogs and
> wikis, and those who disagree about their proper interpretation given
> mechanisms to air those disagreements in some structured form, to me
> it still feels like progress...
>
> Dan
>
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