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Open data – opportunities and challenges for the geological survey community

Open data – opportunities and challenges for the geological survey community. GIC 28, Orléans , June 3 rd 2013 Richard Hughes. What is Open Data? Where and why? What are open data approaches achieving? What are the opportunities and challenges for our community?

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Open data – opportunities and challenges for the geological survey community

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  1. Open data – opportunities and challenges for the geological survey community GIC 28, Orléans, June 3rd 2013 Richard Hughes

  2. What is Open Data? • Where and why? • What are open data approaches achieving? • What are the opportunities and challenges for our community? • How can these be balanced - the way forward? Acknowledgements: screenshots,images, logos from Google, Open Knowledge Foundation. Also ubiquitous computing, mobile platforms etc.

  3. What does ‘Open Data’ mean? ‘Open data is data that can be freely used, re-used and re-distributed by anyone – subject only to the requirement to attribute’ (OpenDefinition.org). Key features: • Availability and access: data available in suitable machine-readable format free of charge (or at reasonable reproduction cost), preferably by web download • Re-use and re-distribution: data provided under unrestricted re-use and re-distribution terms, including ‘mashing’ with other data-sets • Universal participation: everyone must be able to use, re-use and re-distribute, with no discrimination or restrictions (e.g. ‘commercial’ and ‘non-commercial’ use) • cf. Open Source, Open Knowledge

  4. Where and why?

  5. Who’s driving it? See Sir Tim Berners-Lee on www.ted.com - ‘next generation web’

  6. Open data in science is not new • 1957-8: concept of open access to scientific data established with creation of World Data Centre system (International Geophysical Year) • 2004: science ministers of OECD nations declared all publicly funded data should be made publicly available; in 2007 this became ‘soft-law’ recommendation • Open access to research outputs in UK since 2006 • Fast, ubiquitous computing as a catalyst

  7. Arguments for open data • ‘Data belong to the human race’ - a very strong view with regard to genomes, data on organisms, medical science, and environmental data (e.g. fracking, rad-waste issues) • Data are essential for the smooth running of communal human activities (e.g. health care, education etc.) • ‘Public money was used to fund the work and so it should be universally available’ • Sponsors of research do not get full value unless the resulting data are freely available • Rate of discovery in science research is accelerated by better access to data • Transparency, empowerment, innovation and economic benefits…

  8. Economic impacts of open data • Open goverment data across EU would increase business activity by €40 BN with indirect benefits of €140 BN • Finnish SMEs grow 15% more with free geo-data; effect stronger after 2 years • 5000 jobs in Spain created by PSI re-use • Address data in Denmark Sources: EPSI Platform, Vickery study, www.adresse-info.dk

  9. Arguments against open data • Collecting, conditioning, managing and disseminating data are cost-intensive processes – providers should be able to recover their costs • If public funds are used to aggregate the data that benefit only a few commercial users, those users should reimburse costs of data provision • Privacy concerns, e.g. health data • Costs recovered or revenues earned by publishing data permits non-profit organisations to fund other activities

  10. Opportunities • Scientific collaboration • Human genome project • OneGeology • Mass collaboration (enabled by ubiquitous computing) - OpenStreetMap • OpenStreetMap year of edits

  11. Opportunities • Crowd-sourcing or ‘Citizen science’: ‘publish your data and harness the innovation, creativity and resources of the connected world’, e.g: • Zooniverse • mySoil mobile app

  12. Opportunities • Communicating the value of our work through higher visibility • Increasing socio-economic impacts and benefits

  13. Challenges of open data • Legal, privacy, commercial confidentiality • Probably the greatest challenge is financial – balancing desire to publish open data with the requirement to generate income • ’Freemium’ offers a balanced way forward - i.e. free data, chargeable information products and services – can also create new business opportunities

  14. Conclusions • Open data – a fast-growing movement supported by governments, citizens, and organisations worldwide • Presents huge opportunities: • Scientific collaboration • Citizen science • Raising visibility • New business models needed • How are you responding?

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