Openeverything

Open Everything

Dr Chris Thorpe@jaggeree

HTTP://WWW.FLICKR.COM/PHOTOS/JAGGEREE/

I make things. I make things out of data, and code and mobile devices and services, paper, pens, music and tea are an integral part of the process too.

Left Right

Transparency/openness

“It’s our data”

Helping bring levelplaying field in

service quality to all

Public-private partnerships

Equality in procurement

Small government

Keeping checks onpublic sector spending

Putting public servicesin private hands

Developing an innovationeconomy with many new business owners

Derive wealth and tax revenue

Free market economy

The data thing is important, and the public data thing is really important. The colours for this slide are switched for the UK as I first showed the slide in the US.

But there are both left wing and right wing reasons for public data.

And although I’m more left than right, for me personally, the generation of an app economy and new services built on data are more compelling than the oft touted transparency benefits. I was part of the team that launched the developer preview of data.gov.uk and the origins of things like the licensing terms on UK government data relate to commercial use. It’s critical, without it businesses can’t form and anything that is made is largely ephemeral as people can’t keep hobbies updated forever.

So what sort of things can you make with government data.

Well you can chart the energy use of buildings and government departments

You can map the energy use so you can visualise it. The circle’s radius relates to energy use per square foot of building, the colour to energy use per full time equivalent employee. The big red circle is the MOD

You can also visualise the spending of the government on aid in Africa and see where your money goes

And even visualise what it’s spent on and see that if you provide money for infrastructure over time then you have to provide less for humanitarian assistance if there are times of need

You can even audit your local council’s spending and see where the most money goes each month. You can even look right down to the level of individual invoices.

HTTP://WWW.FLICKR.COM/PHOTOS/WHEATLAND/

I’m bored with transparency data and armchair auditing

It’s dull. And I’m bored

Actually

I’m bored stupid

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and how many of these peoplewill ever be really touched by it

There’s something at odds for me here. And it’s to do with how many people’s lives will ever really be touched by transparency data. For sure you can tell me that if the media put pressure on making public spending accountable we’ll spend less and public services will improve. However the number of everyday people who will look at the figures will be low. How low?

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Probably the same sort of level as the save the spotted owl campaign.

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give us the good stuff that’llchange people’s lives

There is however lots of public data that will enrich and enhance and improve lots of people’s lives, every day, day in day out. And it can build new businesses which will have sustainable business models. And it all relates to one immutable truth about life.

We all live at a point in time and space

HTTP://WWW.FLICKR.COM/PHOTOS/CHRISSCHOENBOHM/

Which is that we all live in time and space. We’re here right now, we want to know about what is near us, who is near us?

HTTP://BERGLONDON.COM/PROJECTS/HAT/

Bend the services you produce around the user

And it all relates to something that government services don’t traditionally do very well. They don’t bend themselves around a user and where they are, what they are, what they need at that time.

This to me is all about user centric service design and user centric information. Government services are essentially state run monopolies where success is measured in abstract metrics and the ability to hit specific milestones/agreed functionality.

It’s like the world saying to Facebook, as it started, you have a 5 year monopoly to provide social networking. They succeeded because they made a good user centric product. They had evolutionary selective pressures, users, on them to make sure they made a product good enough for people to tell their friends about. Imagine we had that for public services, that’s what public data is good for.

Or my favourite things like this Rupert Reddington’s wonderful Awesomeometer about the good and cultural things that surround you, made for the Rewired Culture event. It’s the perfect counterpoint to the depressing Asborometer

And at a recent Rewired State a team of us made a brand new two player board game about filling the knowledge gap that exists in parents to be. Sadly it never made it into the real world as an election was called as the pilot was about to be commissioned. It’s all about finding playful ways to help people find the things they don’t know that they need to know and then where those things are in the real world.

HTTP://WWW.FLICKR.COM/PHOTOS/SCRAPLAB/

At the first government developer day, Tom Taylor, Dan Catt and Gavin Bell made a newspaper about all the relevant government data for a postcode, helping you to settle in to a new area.

And BERG have made school information user centric in Schooloscope

This is my favourite piece of user centric information. Owls near you. It does what it says on the tin. You tell it where you are

HTTP://OWLSNEARYOU.COM/

It tells you where the owls are. Perfectly user centric information

So much so that I subverted it around MRSA. The real problem with government health data is it’s released by press release which always talks about highs and lows and never about the things around you, this contextualises the data to you and where you are

Such as in London

Or where I lived as a child in Shoreham

And it tells you about trends, whether the hotel is doing better or worse

HTTP://WWW.FLICKR.COM/PHOTOS/TOASTKID/

March 9th 2006

I’d like to talk about where and when things started in some ways for me, this is Charles Arthur and this is when he blogged at The Guardian about freeing our data

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Free our Data

The interesting thing is the data he asked for first is about place. It’s always time and place. Without it you can’t build interesting services. We’re still largely missing the time data. The data about when our trains run.

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Public data is growth media for an ecosystem to form

Public data is the nutrient of a whole new eco system and allows new things to happen

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Let’s have the data that makes a difference to quality of life

Public data is the nutrient of a whole new eco system and allows new things to happen. New businesses to flourish. If you think this is pie in the sky, here’s an example

HTTP://WWW.FLICKR.COM/PHOTOS/THOMASHAWK/

There’s a place where this is beginning to work and that’s BART in San Francisco and their real time data.

Real time data is the next place for us to work on government to get it released.

It’s key to building user centric apps which have a business model.

They released all of their data on their schedule (where and when trains are) and then on their live real-time feed (where and when the trains really are). Two interesting things happened.

Over time, ridership increased 7%, people could depend more on public transport.

There’s also an app ecosystem, as you can see here the most bought iPhone app for BART, iBartLive costs more than a Simpson’s game which contains licensed data and images.

HTTP://WWW.FLICKR.COM/PHOTOS/CASS_SCULPTURE/

Let’s have the data that makes a difference to enjoyment of life

But it doesn’t stop around making a difference to quality of life, there are many studies that show the link between the happiness and wealth of a country and culture.

HTTP://WWW.FLICKR.COM/PHOTOS/PMEIDINGER/

This is how I see public data. Not tedious spreadsheets of boring old transactions.

Public art for instance. I mean, we have a government art collection. Me and you, we own it. It isn’t visible though, it would be lovely if we could really enjoy it, take it with us as an app.

I made a prototype app at Rewired Culture, we’re now doing a bit more of it.

chris.thorpe@artfinder.com

Chris Thorpe

mark.norman.francis@artfinder.com

Mark Norman Francis

james.aylett@artfinder.com+44.7976.212.023

James Aylett

paul.pod@artfinder.com+44.7718.694.329

Paul Pod

spencer.hyman@artfinder.com+44.7968.801.069

Spencer Hyman

priscilla.li@artfinder.com+44.7595.775.169

Priscilla Li

paul.holberton@artfinder.com+44.7974.159.437

Paul Holberton

@artfinder / #newstartup

We’ve formed a company and one of the data sets we hope to open up for people’s enjoyment is the Government Art Collection

We’ve even updated and improved on the prototype and are building more like it.

We want to open up art so that everyone can enjoy it, but opening up doesn’t meaning disrespecting rights holders, we’re doing everything we can so that we attribute data and attribute financial value back to the people who let us use their content

We’re making some data ourselves, simple art guides that contextualise and open culture to everyman

And we’re curating, pulling in data from different sources.

And we’re giving back too, we’re making an API

Four Comp

It’s all part of building the ecosystem we’re building at the moment.

Which includes apps, such as this prototype app we made which takes data about where the Sisley’s are in public collections around the UK so that you can find out easily, look at them on your iPad and be inspired about visiting.

Real data that changes people’s lives and drives sales of apps, sales of print on demand pictures and drives tourism and footfall and revenue to museums and galleries when they need it most.

We’re only at the dawn of it all...

We’re just getting started, but it’s my belief that public data can create new economies, improve procurement processes and through evolutionary pressure in the marketplace increase the useability and user centricity of applications that access government services...

We owe it to the consumers of those services to provide an environment where they can get new and better access to them, mediated by the ingenuity of developers.

HTTP://WWW.FLICKR.COM/PHOTOS/45131642@N00/

If you imagine how people would have laughed at the early things made with plastic. But plastic is a material that with time gave us its zenith, the Airfix kit. Just think of the sort of things we’ll be able to make and the new businesses that’ll exist if we get our hands on the right sort of public data building materials.

Thank you

Dr Chris Thorpe@jaggeree/@artfinder

Thank you

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