[OpenSpending] spendingdata.org: Developing a standard for transaction-level spending data

Mon Jul 9 21:01:08 UTC 2012

Hi all,

we've been considering the idea of creating a reference format for
spending data for a while now. It's a good idea: what if many
governments - on different levels - were to release their spending in
a uniform, compatible format? Governments would have it easier to
figure out how to their publish data. Techies like us could begin to
build tools for analyzing the data that truly scale. NGOs and think
tanks could easily see what's in the data, without having to embark on
a technology project first. Eventually, the data could even become
comparable across different environments, raising many interesting
questions.

We'd like to invite you to brainstorm with us: how would a simple,
pragmatic standard for spending data look? Through the recent GIFT
report, we've surveyed lots of similar initiatives [1] and collected
some rough ideas. Building on this, we're now looking for your support
in contributing your ideas against this straw man:

http://openspending.org/resources/standard/index.html

It's by far not concrete enough to actually build a validator ("rough
consensus and running code"), but with all of your help I'm hoping
that we'll get there quickly. If we can build support for such an
idea, we can convince some of those countries who have already opened
up their data to use better formats to do it; while giving concrete
guidance to those who are only now starting to share their spending
data.

Best wishes,

 - Friedrich

[1] http://openspending.org/resources/gift/index.html