Making government data available online for mashups - US moving to legislate

The US government has taken the first holistic step towards making federal data available online in bulk.

This would allow the public to reuse the data, mash it up with other sources and repackage it online in innovative ways - potentially uncovering relationships and new uses that were never conceived of by the government.

Reported in Threat Level in the article, An API for Federal Legislation? Congress Wants Your Opinion, the first step calls for a feasibility study to assess the cost of making data publicly available in bulk.

The step is being enshrined in the new Omnibus Appropriations Bill, which is already in the process of being passed.

In the words of the sponsor for the feasibility study,

“In our web 2.0 world, we can empower the public by providing them with raw data that they can remix and reuse in new and innovative ways," says Honda, who is vice chairman of the Appropriations Subcommittee on the Legislative Branch. "With these tools, the public can collaborate on projects that can help legislators to create better policies to address the pressing challenges facing our nation.”

The Australian government has a great deal of data which could similarly be freed up to work for the common good of the nation, but access to it varies by department and there are no common standards for how it should be made public.

Perhaps we also need a centralised legislative approach to move towards greater and more consistent access.

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Should rail timetables be restricted under government copyright?

NSW has been the scene of an interesting series of events over the last week regarding the right of iPhone developers to republish NSW Rail timetables in their applications.

Covered in the Sydney Morning Herald articles, CityRail puts brakes on iPhone timetable app and How RailCorp's derailing commuter 'apps', last week it emerged that NSW Rail had threatened four developers with legal action for repackaged NSW rail timetables into applications for iPhones, breaching copyright.

The reason for the legal action given to the SMH was,

"RailCorp's primary concern is that our customers receive accurate, up-to-date timetable information," a spokeswoman said in a statement.

Next the NSW Premier stepped in and as covered in the article, Rees orders RailCorp to talk to iPhone app makers, releasing the news publicly initially via his PremierofNSW Twitter account.

I've blogged previously about the need for government to make it easier to reuse publicly released government information.

Why copyright material that is made available online anyway? if the aim is to simply prevent out-of-context use or commercial reselling, there are options like Creative Commons available.

Indeed the ABS has taken steps in this direction, beginning to publish most website content under a Creative Commons license.

I envisage timetables as an appropriate type of information to be offered as a web service or RSS feed. This would allow NSW Rail full control over the accuracy of the information while allowing other websites and mobile applications to integrate it into their offerings. The public can then vote with their feet as to which version of the information they prefer, and how much they are willing to pay for it.

Much the same type of service is already offered by the Bureau of Meteorology - and the success of OzWeather on the iPhone is a testament to the successful integration of information possible when there's a web-savvy government agency and a developer who finds a way to add value to the raw data.

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Practical benefits of online media for government

Some of the practical benefits for government of online social media are beginning to emerge from various jurisdictions around the world. One that has particularly struck me as very positive is the use of online media by Washington DC to convince felons to voluntarily turn themselves in.

Written about in Using Social Media to Improve Public Safety - DC’s Fugitive Safe Surrender Prompts 530 Offenders with Warrants to Voluntarily Surrender in a Church (Doc) (and also available in the DC Public Safety Blog blog), the paper details how many fugitives wanted to turn themselves in, but had difficulty trusting police and the legal system to treat them fairly.

While the DC Safe Surrender program was in operation to allow fugitives to turn themselves in at a place of worship, thereby creating a more comfortable experience and a greater sense that they would get a fair go, there were fugitives who still were unsure of how they would be received and, frankly, thought it was simply a scam.

So Washington DC employed an integrated media strategy, using television and radio advertisements to drive fugitives and their friends and families (who often did the research for them) to the DC Safe Surrender website where the program could be clearly explained.

To add faces and personal experiences, the website featured videos of fugitives who had surrendered speaking about their decision and how they felt.

The website not only supported fugitives in making the hard decision to trust the legal authorities, but also convinced the media and other institutions to support the program.

By building the sense of trust and transparency the site has led to a large number of people surrendering and allowing their cases to be heard, reducing the workload on enforcement agencies and also the possibility of those on the run of re-offending simply to stay out of the clutches of a legal system they didn't trust.

That's the power of the online channel. To allow individuals to share their experiences in a one-to-one fashion, establishing a level of trust that is hard for an institution to match.

Once this trust is established it can be referred or inferred from the individual back to an institution, allowing institutions to build their level of trust with individuals.

This isn't a new approach for the commercial sector - it's known as word of mouth advertising. It has been shown many times that the trust built out of personal relationships is much more powerful than trust in 'traditional' advertising.

Could your agency improve its outcomes by improving the level of trust and respect your customers have in it?

If so, online may offer you approaches to build this trust in a more cost-effective and interpersonal way than the old 'print-radio-TV-outdoor' mix of advertising options.

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PDFs can be accessible!

I've previously applauded the efforts of the Human Rights Commissioner to draw attention to government websites who provide inaccessible content via WebWatch.

Even where an agency's overall site may be designed according to accessibility guidelines, when certain key information is presented only in PDF format, this information can be inaccessible.

However I've also been a little cautious of the 'PDF is bad' approach.

The PDF format can be made accessible. If you use Adobe's software to generate PDFs there are a set of tools for ensuring documents are accessible, including the ability to assess the accessibility, tag images with alternate text and set the reading order for content.

Correct formatting of the original document (such as the use of standard heading levels) also goes a long way to improving accessibility, as does some thought around colour contrasts and use of text rather than graphics of text. These approaches apply as much for PDF as they do for HTML content.

So I'm pleased to see that Stap Isi has posted about several presentations where people have been explaining to public servants how to create accessible PDF documents in the article, My name is b3rn and I make PDFs.

I don't think government is likely to abandon PDF any time soon, so ensuring that public servants are trained to generate accessible PDFs is crucial.

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Over 100 UK councils wild for Twitter

Over in the UK councils are being to adopt micro-blogging in a major way, with over 100 councils now using Twitter to make announcments and have two way conversations with their constituencies.

The UK council association has published an article, Councils turn to new media, which discusses the uses councils are making of the service - addressing complaints and informing citizens of issues.

A demonstration of this interaction is discussed in a post on The blog of the IDeA Strategy and Development Unit, Turn a frown upside down: councillors, Twitter and “customer” interaction.

In case you want to see who in UK councils are tweeting formally, visit Cllr Tweeps.

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