Open Data 101How Linux & Open Source Are Enabling Open Data

What Is Open Data?

Textbook definition:

Open data is data that can be freely used, re-used and redistributed by anyone - subject only, at most, to the requirement to attribute and sharealike.http://opendatahandbook.org/guide/en/what-is-open-data/

Federal Government Definition

High-value information is information that can be used to increase agency accountability and responsiveness; improve public knowledge of the agency and its operations; further the core mission of the agency; create economic opportunity; or respond to need and demand as identified through public consultation.

Federal Government Standards

Public.

Accessible.

Described.

Reusable.

Complete.

Timely.

Managed Post-Release.

Open Data Timeline

1995: First known appearance in print. (scientific agency)

5/2006: CKAN 0.1 released

10/2007: DC launches first govt. Data catalog

12/2007: Open data advocacy meeting in Sebastopol, CA - 30 Internet / Open Source advocates

Open Data Timeline Cont.

1/20/2009: President Obama signs the Memorandum on Transparency and Open Government

2/2009: Tim Berners-Lee TED Talk on need for govt. to release raw data

5/2009: Data.gov launched

Summer 2009: NY State Senate first government organization to post government data to GitHub

Open Data Timeline Cont.

5/2010: CKAN releases V 1.0 (Python app)

5/2013: President Obama issues Executive Memo requiring all government data to default to machine readable and open. Also Project Open Data website is launched.

9/2013: DKAN launched (Drupal)

5/2016: Open Data Act introduced in Congress

Open Data Today

3/2016: White House issues draft policy on open source use by government, puts FY2017 proposed budget on GitHub.

Govt Agencies sponsor hackathons to encourage innovative use of their data. (Earth Day Hackathon 4/22 at GSA!)

Data.gov has over 194,000 datasets

States / Cities are following, in some cases leading

Why is Open Data Important?

Transparency

Government Ops Innovation

Civic Empowerment

Economic Development

So How Are We Really Doing?

Dashboards

Federal: https://labs.data.gov/dashboard/offices/2015-11-30

States: https://census.usopendata.org/

New York City: https://data.cityofnewyork.us/dashboard

Examples

Don’t Eat At

Fix My Street

AirNow

Bank Local

College Scorecard

Leafsnap

Resources

Open Data Handbook

Data.gov

CKAN

DKAN

Open Data Inception

CartodB