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Open Data at ChangeCamp Edmonton
Tomorrow morning local politicians, bureaucrats, and ordinary citizens will gather at the University of Alberta for ChangeCamp Edmonton. I’m encouraged by the number of people that have registered, and by the conversations that have already started. That’s what tomorrow is all about: getting people together to discuss ideas and solutions.
I don’t know exactly which topics people will want to discuss tomorrow, but I know for sure that open data will be one of them. There’s significant momentum building for the concept, and we’re starting to see progress on making it happen throughout Canada (and elsewhere).
Open data here in Edmonton received a nice boost this week from Councillor Don Iveson when he submitted a formal inquiry to City administration:
In local, national and sub-national governments around the world there is a trend toward making up-to-date government information freely available on-line in generically accessible data formats as so-called ‘Open Data’.
- What level of awareness does the City Administration have regarding Open Data in municipal government?
- What current initiatives are underway within City Administration that might qualify under the spirit of Open Data?
- What further initiatives are under consideration within the city, and on what basis are they being evaluated?
- Is Administration monitoring any successes and or challenges with this trend in other jurisdictions, especially large Canadian cities, and if so what can be shared with Council?
- What would City Administration’s recommendation be on next steps regarding Open Data plans or strategies?
I know there was already some things going on behind the scenes at the City of Edmonton, but Don’s inquiry should expedite and give credibility to those things. This is an important step.
I’ve been pushing for open data in Edmonton for a while now, along with many others. I think ChangeCamp will be a great opportunity to further discuss the concept and next steps. I generally think about open data in the context of a municipality, but there’s room for discussion at the provincial and federal levels too. Here are some of the key things I think we can cover:
- Let’s make sure everyone (citizens, politicians, City administration) is on the same page about what we mean by “open data”. This could be high level (what kinds of data are open) and low level (what formats are considered open).
- What is the City working on? What are citizens working on? Let’s get a status report from both sides.
- What kinds of data could be made open? Which data is most in demand by citizens? What data has been made available in other cities, such as Vancouver or Toronto?
- Licensing is vital for open data to work. We need to ensure data is licensed as permissively as possible, otherwise we’re restricting its utility. Which licenses make sense? What have other municipalities used?
- Often lost in the discussion about what data to make available is how to be notified of changes to that data. RSS feeds, email subscriptions – how should citizens be notified when data is updated or otherwise changed?
- Another aspect that we need to consider: the creation of data. There is lots and lots of data that our governments can start making available in open formats, but there’s even more data created on a daily basis. What can we do to ensure that it is open data also? How about APIs or other mechanisms for citizens to provide input/data? Open 311 comes to mind.
Here are some links that might be useful tomorrow:
- Foundations for an Open Edmonton
- Calgary takes first steps toward becoming an Open City
- Open Data in Edmonton? Follow Vancouver’s lead
- ETS Data for Developers
- Vancouver’s Open Data Catalogue
- Vancouver’s Open Data Portal: Use it, or Lose it
- ChangeCamp Ottawa: Open Data and Open Access
- ChangeCamp Ottawa session
- ChangeCamp Toronto session
See you in the morning!
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Tags: changecamp, changecampedmonton, data, edmonton, government, opendata, politics, yegchange
Categories: Uncategorized | 8 Comments »
October 16th, 2009 at 1:26 pm
Excellent summary and intro for tomorrow Mack. I also want to have a conversation around inclusion in respect to the report that “administration” needs to take back to Council per Councillor Iveson’s inquiry.
I want the report to be a reflection of open, a report on OpenData using an open and collaborative process.
Looking forward to ChangeCamp
October 16th, 2009 at 1:31 pm
Good idea Chris, let’s definitely chat about that!
October 18th, 2009 at 6:35 pm
[...] had for actions coming out of the day. Three such ideas were proposed – one dealing with open data, and two others that I can’t [...]
October 19th, 2009 at 11:02 am
[...] Oct 19: Mack Male has posted further salient thoughts after a Change Camp session on this topic this past [...]
October 21st, 2009 at 7:16 pm
[...] Mastermaq’s open data blog post [...]
November 28th, 2009 at 4:03 pm
[...] Opinions are easy, ideas are hard: There were some great discussions ranging from open data, the evolution of media and technology, but it felt like much of the debate around revitalizing [...]
November 29th, 2009 at 9:51 pm
[...] had for actions coming out of the day. Three such ideas were proposed – one dealing with open data, and two others that I can’t [...]
January 13th, 2010 at 10:01 am
[...] data to City administration on October 14, 2009. A few days later, the community talked again about open data at ChangeCamp Edmonton on October 17, 2009, focusing on Councillor Iveson’s inquiry. That event led to the creation of [...]