SLA Event (Part 1): Open Data: Powering the Information age

This is the first of a two-part post about an event I attended last night (21st Feb), organised by the Society for Location Analysis (SLA). It was held in Hampshire County Council’s headquarters in Winchester, but the SLA – and its sponsors CBRE – kindly picked up the tab.

There were just under thirty present – enough to make it a ‘proper’ event, but sufficiently few to keep it nice and informal. Amongst our number were location specialists, information managers, researchers, techies and others just interested in a conversation blending geography, information, location and open data. Even the organisations were an unusual mix, including several councils, the Army, Police, Fire & Rescue, private consultancies, academia, and a couple of large retailers.

There were several excellent presentations which I couldn’t hope to do justice to, so I’m just going to share a few of what I felt were the highlights. Besides which, the slides should be online shortly, so you can see for yourself.

Introduction

Peter Sleight

The SLA chairman Peter Sleight introduced the event, explaining that 2012 is the tenth anniversary for the SLA, and that there’ll be ‘a bit of a do’ in April to celebrate. He also mentioned that this was the first time the SLA had a meeting with more attendees from the public sector than the private sector.

Peter went on to shared his perspective on open data. I’m not  familiar enough with the background to explain the detail, but I think it’s probably fair to say that he’s pretty keen on opening up address data for businesses and feels that there’s still a lot more that can be done to remove barriers, particularly for smaller companies who can’t afford fees.

Peter then went on to introduce the next speaker, Professor Nigel Shadbolt from the University of Southampton

Open Data: Powering the Information Age

Professor Nigel Shadbolt

Nigel started by asking for a quick show of hands to find out:

• how many present were technologists (very few),
• who had heard Nigel speak before (very few)
• how many present use spatial analysis or spatial statistics (lots)

He then took a quick look at the background to data and suggested that “the guys at Google” are comparable to the great Victorian engineers. He rattled through examples and analogies far quicker than I could hope to keep up (I do so hope he shares his slides!)

Nigel loves data and loves its power – for example Search and click analysis. He noted that Google Trends was great, but that sometimes the best bits of products, having first established themselves, then seem to disappear (at least from open products)

He referred to Flu mapping in real time using powerful analytics as great examples, but emphasised the need to work with large corporates on their data as well – it’s not just the public sector which holds valuable public data.

Nigel then went on to talk about Flickr uploads shown on an openstreetmap, and showed an example of them plotted on a detailed map of London. He played the brief video clip of the OpenStreetMap – Project Haiti, which demonstrates just how much can be achieved in a very short time through crowd sourcing. In that example, people used open source software with GPS devices to crowd source a high definition map of an earthquake zone. That brilliant achievement was only possible through open standards, open licenses and open data

In 2009 Nigel and colleagues produced the Postcode Paper which they took to Cabinet – 80 percent of the data in the paper was technically illegally produced, even though it was  data with great public value. That helped to demonstrate why barriers and obstacles had to be removed to help open up new opportunities.

Detailed studies haven’t yet been published on the economic value that can be derived from open data. Two studies have been commissioned by Ordnance Survey that report on the economic impact of ordnance survey open data, but the conclusions haven’t yet been made publicly available.

Nigel made an interesting observation about the economics of open data – they needn’t be traditional, and that it’s more about elasticity, and how you generate value from it.

A few other quick points he made:

• Cities are very interesting as they are natural generators of coordinated data – there are fewer obstacles get in the way. (N.B. That reminded me that CityCamp Brighton is coming up 2nd-4th March)
• Civil servants and their local authority counterparts are trying very hard to get the data published – it takes lots of effort!
• The unrestrictive license is the most important thing about open data – the open government license is the “crowning glory” – Nigel suggested always aiming to make data available under the Open Government Licence (OGL) wherever possible
• Linked data – good example in Hampshire already with ordnance survey creating 5 star data that can be linked to. (N.B. John Goodwin has done lots of work on that, much of it in his own time).
• Nigel wants a Companies House URI
• Data will have a long tail – data that will be pointed to that will help make sense of all the other data
• Even if you decide not to publish data as open data, allow the reference points in your data to be the same as the reference points within public data. Then, should you change your mind in the future, it will be much easier to publish as open data.
• Significant new data releases, e.g. Weather, transport and health The freeing up of weather data can free up a secondary market  (it’s a big secondary market in the US)
• The location of the post office tower was once an official secret, even though it was plainly visible!
• Find your post box – crowd sourced accurate data through people visiting postboxes with their smartphone and recording box number and GPS coordinates
• Public services will increasingly crowd source the data we can’t produce ourselves.
• Citizen science is happening everywhere People taking old nautical reports and entering them in to databases.
• Data probably has a long tail – just because relatively few people use a particular data set doesn’t mean it doesn’t have lots of value
• Midata – the next battle round will be consumer data – making people’s own data open to themselves
• New economic circumstances can be brought about by opening up individual’s data (to themselves)
• There is a range of data from Big Data (a term which Nigel hates) through to very small data. Most of it will be somewhere in the middle. A spreadsheet can tell you a lot if it’s the right data.
• Not all data fits along one dimension
• Open data can be a cheaper way to deliver services – you can achieve the end in a different way
• The “sainted Berners-Lee” said: “The value of government data is in its widespread use, not in its sale”
• People find the stuff that’s interesting, and they link to it
• CEOs are starting to see the benefit of open data for themselves Spending data has become a source of inspiration for CEOs
• There is a lot of innovation going on with open data, it’s just not that visible yet

That’s all for this week (I’ve run out of steam for tonight)

In the second half of this post I will cover the other two excellent presentations given by Ian Holt and Chris Parker (aka @Geovation).

LocalGovCampNW (Part 2)

This is Part 2 of a post about LocalGovCampNW, an unconference held in Preston on 4th February. It’s the second instalment, as last week I ran out of time, and had to get something in by midday on Thursday to meet Weekly Blog Club‘s deadline.

I was interested in most of the session pitches but, sadly, could only attend one at a time. The rest of this post attempts to summarise some of the points raised in the sessions I attended.

Organisational change and social media

The first session I went to was loosely based around organisational change and social media. Memorable bits for me:

• Large self-organising groups existed way before the term ‘social media’ was invented. As Clay Shirky remarked in Here Comes Everybody: Revolution doesn’t happen when society adopts new technologies – it happens when society adopts new behaviours.
• Camps are non-hierarchical; attendees share a common interest in constructive change, and are prepared to devote large chunks of their own time to share with – and learn from – each other
• Change can occur from the bottom-up as well as top-down
• Camps are no passing fad – the fact that so many keep on attending various different camps like UKGovCamp, LocalGovCamp, LocalGovCampNW and BluelightCamp show they have staying-power
• Sugata Mitra put a computer in a wall which helped children in a slum learn without supervision. I’m surprised I han’t heard about that before, as it’s an inspirational story. If you haven’t seen it, he gave a great TED Talk about it in July 2010.
• Someone made an interesting assertion about councillors – that it’s their job to disrupt. That hadn’t occurred to me, but there might be something to it.
• There are many examples of collective and collaborative action – frequently assisted by social media – surely we can do more of this in local government
• Social media is a means to an end, not an end in its own right
• Can’t individuals – professionals – use social media as part of their job? The analogy given was the official closing a road who tweets to say it’s closed and why it’s closed.
• Social media provides huge opportunities to engage directly with the public. Experts in their field just need guidance and maybe some training and social media can become a useful tool
• There was consensus that empowered people behave responsibly
• Many businesses have been using social media for years to engage with their customers (admittedly, with varying degrees of success). Yes, there are risks, but they should be managed.
• Shropshire has an online newsroom – they don’t issue press statements any longer
• Social media is widely used within organisations to help the flow of information – via conversation. Business networking tools like Yammer are in use throughout the public sector. Other tools like The Knowledge Hub are being developed by and for the sector.
• LinkedIn is another opportunity for local government to engage with business, particularly via groups
• There was the story of a councillor who couldn’t access email in the council chamber, so she brought in her own Mifi thereby creating her own wireless network. She and her colleagues then used that access their email.

Just a few of he participants at LocalgovcampNW

This particular session began with a presentation and then moved to a discussion. It was very interesting, but there was a bit too much emphasis on presentation for my liking, and not enough discussion. I’m not sure everyone got a chance to speak either. I think in future I’d prefer to do away with PowerPoint altogether and focus on conversation, ensuring that everyone who wants to speak gets the chance to do so.

Digital Inclusion and Adult Learning

I looked at the title of this session and thought it’s not something I know very much about. That’s usually a bit of a trigger for me – I like to find out more about stuff I know nothing about. My experience in this area is limited to trying to show my dad how to use Word and email over ten years ago. It was hard work, but we got there, mostly because he knew what he wanted to achieve, and he was very determined to succeed.

A few highlights from this session:

• Training courses can be geared towards what we think people should know
• People on courses are generally polite when they give feedback – they may tick boxes saying they’re satisfied, when actually they haven’t learned what they want to learn
• People’s computers and software at home usually don’t conform to the standard kit they are trained on in a classroom. They may return home from a course and get stuck at the very first hurdle. Without further help they might well give up.
• Kate Norman talked about some work she’s doing with an informal group of people in Cumbria who share their knowledge. In Kate’s words: “I teach people whatever they want to learn”. The group is part of the University of the Third Age (U3A) which I hadn’t heard of before. According to the U3A web site: U3As are self-help, self-managed lifelong learning co-operatives for older people no longer in full time work. What a brilliant idea.
• A lady whose name I didn’t catch said: “The iPad is a gift for older people – it makes it very easy for people to get online.” She mentioned an elderly gentleman who has an iPad he uses to read The Telegraph online, Mail online, and BBC sport – nothing else. It just does what he wants it to do.
• Trust when training can be an issue – too much trust  - people keep giving their passwords to trainers even when told not to.

Time passed very quickly and I’m not sure we explored the subject in sufficient depth, or from a sufficient number of perspectives. One of the great things about the camps is that the conversations go on long after the physical meetings are over. Lots of people blog about them, and then others comment on the blogs, ensuring interesting debates continue. It also allows others to join in. A good example from this session is Daniel Goodwin’s blog post which attracted further discussion and resulted in new material being posted.

Wikipedia – how volunteers can help local government

Like many people with a computer, I use Wikipedia all the time. I might begin by searching for something on Google, but frequently I find myself reading a Wikipedia article because it’s been returned as one of the top search results. I might use Wikipedia all the time, but I don’t actually know very much about it, or its many potential uses. Fortunately, there’s a man who does – Andy Mabbett aka @Pigsonthewing.

Andy Mabbett caught in the act of editing a Wikipedia article

Andy’s pitch for this session was how local government – particularly galleries, libraries, archives and museums – can make use of Wikipedia volunteers. I only managed to take a few notes during this session (I confess, I was trying out the Wikipedia iPhone app Andy demonstrated early on). A few of the points I did manage to write down: The QRpedia project is about ‘the things’ in museums and galleries. Basically, by using QR Codes visitors can be delivered a Wikipedia article on an item in the language of their choosing. I won’t attempt to explain it fully as I wouldn’t do justice to it. Besides which, Andy blogged about it in his post: Talking about GLAM, Wikipedia and QRpedia in Amsterdam and Hamburg

Andy described how he visits local government staff and managers to explain how it all works, he also offers training for both staff and volunteers. Most councils have scarce resources and use of volunteers can help museums, galleries and other facilities to realise the potential they might not have achieved otherwise. He explained that volunteers can help analyse artistic style, subject, and biographies – in his experience sometimes achieving really excellent quality. Other benefits include a reduction in the volume of basic informational requests.

Andy recommends giving a license that enables people to copy and share images. He suggested that – unless images are very famous and valuable – any lost income might easily be offset by sharing, through increased publicity and therefore footfall. He went on to discuss Wikimedia Commons which is a database of freely usable media files. Anybody can use re-use Wikipedia content – it’s all available under an open license, so is free to use with attribution The only exception is those images available under fair use.

Lots of councils have many thousands of pages on their web sites but are under pressure to reduce the volume. Andy suggests that, instead of deleting content, it could just be moved to Wikipedia instead. It does mean giving up control of the content, but the old saying: many hands make light work, applies.

I’m not quite sure how that led on to Tetranitratoxycarbon, but it was an interesting story. It tells of a ten year girl in America who built a model of a chemical not known to science. Scientists say it is hypothetically possible, and they are working to synthesise it. It is predicted to have explosive possibilities.

Explosive, only in its popularity, is Monmouthpedia which is the first Wikipedia project to cover a whole town. Andy described how the whole community has contributed to the project, which has had great support from the county council. The local press is doing an article each week about the project, and most of the shops and pubs are using QR codes in their shop windows.

I mentioned earlier that I was playing with the Wikipedia iPhone app during some of this session instead of taking notes. It’s jolly good. I love the fact that it shows you Wikipedia articles about what’s near to you now. For the sake of balance, I should also mention that there are also Wikipedia mobile apps for other devices, including Android, Blackberry and Windows.

My notes about the next bit are thin, but I did pick up that:

• It’s totally taboo to make updates which attempt to portray you / your subject in a positive light - every page on Wikipedia has a parallel discussion page where you can state your opinion, ask questions etc.
• There’s a separate policy for curators to enable them to write about their specialist area
• The best inducement for Wikipedia volunteers is cake and the equivalent of a back stage tour (volunteers like to feel they are appreciated)
• Some language teachers set their students an exercise to translate a Wikipedia article – a normal translation exercise might be thrown away afterwards, but a Wikipedia translation could potentially stay forever
• The Wikimedia Foundation spans all the projects, which include:
  • Wikisource – source documents
  • Wikiquote – Bon mots, including correct source
  • Wikiversity – some academic institutions upload their material to it

Andy did set some homework – we all had to register with Wikipedia and edit an article. Fortunately he didn’t set the timescale, as I haven’t done mine yet. It’s on my list though.

Other stuff

As expected, I learned loads during the day. I went with an open mind and wasn’t disappointed. I met lots of interesting people and had the chance to catch up with some I knew already.

An advert by Lancashire County Council featuring a nice use of a QR code

Some voices were louder – oftener – than others, which is a shame because some of the real gems came from the softly spoken and less gregarious. I particularly like the Lightning Talks where everyone gets their three minutes. I’d like to see these included in all unconferences.

Innovative use of QR codes featured throughout the day for me: When I arrived I saw them in an estate agent’s window, QRpedia reaching out to new audiences, and as I was leaving I noticed that Lancashire County Council is using them creatively, as in this example on a poster at Preston railway station.

John Popham is a real star for recording so much of the day, either on video or audio.

Ken Eastwood deserves both thanks and congratulations for making it all happen at LocalgovcampNW, as do sponsors Learning Pool and Jadu.

Preston is a nice place. Oh, and Local Gov Camp North West (Part 1)

Preston & LocalGovCampNW (Part 1)

On Saturday I attended Local Gov Camp North West, or #LocalGovCampNW as it’s known on Twitter. Whilst it’s only a couple of weeks since UK GovCamp, I couldn’t resist going along, even though it’s quite a trek from Hampshire to Preston.

I travelled up by train on Friday evening. There were only four carriages and it was standing room only all the way; it was also very, very warm. Problems on the west coast line meant that the train was even more busy than normal. The conductor kept apologising for the cramped conditions, her tone increasingly desperate as more squeezed in at every stop. Eventually I made it to Preston and checked in to my hotel. A meal, couple of glasses of wine, and a decent night’s sleep sorted me out.

A stroll in Preston

Sunrise over The River Ribble, Preston

On Saturday morning I woke up early and was out walking at 7am. It was a glorious morning, cold but with blue skies and dazzling sunshine. I’ve not visited Preston before and really didn’t know what to expect. The best I could conjure up was an old Beatles lyric which mentioned something about it having 4,000 holes. I hadn’t even got that right, as that was Blackburn, not Preston they’d been referring to. I had to accept, my local knowledge was zero.

Statue of Edward Geoffrey Stanley: The Earl of Derby 1799-1869

According to the map on my ‘phone, something called Avenham Park was nearby, so I went to have a look. It was wonderful – quiet, full of interesting artefacts, well maintained lawns, and a lovely view over the River Ribble.

I learned a little piece of history during that early morning stroll thanks to a statue and Wikipedia: Edward Smith-Stanley was the 14th Earl of Derby. He was Prime Minister of the UK three times, and was one of only four British Prime Ministers to have three or more separate periods in office.

The walk gave me an appetite and I went to find a bakery for breakfast. As I walked to the venue I glanced at an Estate Agent’s window (I think it was Hazelwells in Winkley Street) and saw that every property in their window had its own QR code. What a perfect use for QR codes – house hunters just scan the code to see more information, even when the shop is shut. I didn’t know then, but QR codes were going to be a recurrent theme throughout the day.

LocalGovCamp North West

Ken Eastwood had managed to book the Arts & Media Centre in Fox Street for LocalGovCampNW. It was a good choice of venue, with a nice, friendly atmosphere.
I knew Simon Whitehouse had arrived through an alert on Foursquare. In fact I knew I had arrived as he listed me as being one of the people there with him! There were fewer there than expected. I guesstimated about sixty, compared to the hundred or so who had signed up on Eventbrite. It wasn’t surprising, as the media were once again forecasting Snowmageddon.

Crafting the agenda at LocalGovCampNW

Within five minutes I was learning interesting stuff: Ric Roberts from Swirrl told me about ‘Building the Internet of Things‘, some work that’s taking place in Manchester with Madlab using Arduino. They are looking at the potential to crowd source data like pollution and temperature in central Manchester. I remember Alan Holding first mentioning it at the Lovely Data Transport Hack Day almost a year ago – great to hear about a bright idea being taken forward.

Ken kicked off the day by asking everyone to introduce themselves and say in a word what they were looking for. I was nearly last, and by the time it got to me, all my single word answers had been used by someone else: sharing, learning, collaboration, support, knowledge, and cake.

Attendees with ideas for sessions were then given a minute to make their pitch. I was faced with the camper’s quandary as I was interested in pretty much every session, but could only attend one at a time. Ideas for sessions included:

• Communication at all levels in the council
• Gov.uk, what’s going well, and how can local gov learn from it
• Hyperlocal on the high street – what can we do to help
• Organisational change – do we need to change the whole culture of how we think in order to change the way we work
• Use of social media to get messages out
• What can we do to humanise Systems?
• Open data for bin collections
• Volunteer teaching for old people on digital / computing
• Publishing data on equalities – big pile of information and how to make it accessible to everybody (and at the same time use it to improve ourselves)
• How councillors do (or don’t) use technology
• How to open your sessions up to the world by live streaming
• Open source – why we’re not using it more often
• The role of community learning
• Wikipedia, particularly libraries and use of Wikipedia volunteers
• How can social networks bring people together from different sectors
• Lightning session, three minutes each, to talk about whatever we like

In part 2 of this post I will list some of what I felt were the best bits of the day, and try to suggest how we might get even more out of future camps.

Why I shan’t be blogging this week

I shan’t be blogging this week as it’s already Wednesday evening and I’m tired. The deadline for Weekly Blog Club is midday tomorrow, and I’m in the office first thing, so I’ve only got tonight. No, I’m going to switch off the computer and go and watch the telly box instead.

It’s a shame I can’t be bothered, as I had a few ideas and the beginnings of a couple of posts in draft. There was:

UK GovCamp

I posted some stuff last week, but I’d missed off the Citizens Access to Online Info & Community Engagement session led by Shirley Ayers. Admittedly, my notes were very patchy as I couldn’t keep up – Chris Ellis spouted ideas faster than I could type.  There was the move from a one-to-many relationship to many-to-many; how people use Twitter to talk to each other in a relaxed, friendly way, but organisations still insist on using it to broadcast; there was that point he made about being physically versus existentially close to something: – look out of the window and focus on a sign, suddenly the sign seems closer than the glass separating you; there was the debate about whether LinkedIn is any good or not (I personally find it very useful); then there was “Stigmergy” and the behaviour of ants when they go foraging for food.

How ants led on to Four Square, I’ve no idea. I do remember wingeing about automatic status updates being posted on Twitter and saying that I really don’t care if you just ousted someone as mayor of some restaurant or other. I suppose if I hadn’t have grumbled then I wouldn’t have learned that you can switch off notifications in Four Square, and I also wouldn’t now know that it can automatically dump geolocated data into a Google calendar. So Four Square might actually be useful for people who travel for their job and want to know where they went, and when. As a result I resolved that I’ll have another look at Four Square.

There was also a really interesting discussion about how people use Twitter differently. In my own case I decided “be me” on Twitter. I’m very careful to do most of my tweeting outside normal working hours, hence my tweets tend to be very early in the morning or in the evenings. I might do the odd quick retweet or comment during the day but not very often.  I guess I’m worried about the perception that I’m fittering my time away with distractions. I put “normal working hours” in italics because I’m finding the distinction between my time and work time is meaning less and less. Like many colleagues I do way over the 37.5 hours in my contract, and I often do stuff at weekends. I suppose GovCamp is a case in point, as half of that was on a Saturday but it wasn’t recorded as ‘work’. I saw Twitter in a different light, however, when several others at our session described how their use of Twitter had led to Freedom of Information requests, stalkers and intimidation.

If I had written a follow-up post about UK GovCamp then I could have also said how wonderful it was to meet up again with friends I made at other events – people like Philip John and Tim Davies. I could have also tried to have a proper conversation with Carl Haggerty as I’ve been intending to for ages. I could have also mentioned some of the great people I met for the first time at UK GovCamp, or those I didn’t quite meet but would really like to. But I’ll leave that for another time.

More Twitter Tools

A few weeks ago I blogged about ten of my favourite tools for reporting and analysing Twitter. Since then I’ve found – or been sent – links to loads more. That could have been a whole post in its own right. There are some real goodies like Tweetgrid for monitoring that would be ideally suited to rapidly changing situations where you might want to monitor a bunch of different keywords or hashtags. It struck me as particularly suited to for people organising events or monitoring weather (like: ‘ice’, ‘rain’, flood, ‘snow’ etc). I will definitely blog about that, and some of the other good ones, just not this week.

Yammer

Colleagues grimace whenever I mention Yammer. You might say I’m a bit of a fan.  I’m not necessarily wedded to the product, but I am really keen on the idea of social networking for business. Throughout the public sector there’s huge pressure to be more efficient, reduce costs, break down barriers, and get rid of silos. Unconferences like UKGovCamp and its local government equivalent LocalGovCamp are very effective at helping . The trouble is, they only last a day or two. Yammer, on the other hand, provides an environment in which individuals can ask each other questions, offer advice and support. I think it’s most commonly used within individual organisations. However, there are also external networks which enable individuals to connect across entire sectors. The example I’ve got in mind was originally called localgovernment – but it’s recently been renamed publicsector and anyone with a .gov email address can join. It’s a brilliant example of an active group. There’s also a new network just been set up for constructive disruptors. These are really productive forums. I must blog about that some time too.

No, this week I will just give it a miss and hope @WeeklyBlogClub accepts my apologies. I’ll try and do better next week.

I know I’m biased, but…

I live and work in Hampshire. I’m biased.

But I still think this is really nice.

Camping without the tents: UK GovCamp 2012

I spent Friday and Saturday in London at UK GovCamp 2012, or #UKGC12 as it’s known on Twitter. It was an “unconference” with no prepared agenda. If you aren’t familiar with unconferences, Steph Gray gives a good description in his November 2011 article in The Guardian. It amazes me that so many people are willing to give up large chunks of their weekend for this kind of thing, sometimes travelling all the way from the other end of the country. Many also pay for their own travel and accommodation.

I’m relatively new to GovCamp and LocalGovCamp – my first camp was only last year – but I was immediately hooked. It’s absolutely brilliant to exchange ideas with so many interesting people. There’s also a practical side, and campers often leave with solutions to  problems they’ve been grappling with.

Queuing to suggest topics for UKGC12

On this occasion, Microsoft provided the venue, and the other sponsors  picked up the tab for food and refreshments; they even put money behind the bar in local pubs on both evenings.

A vast amount of knowledge was shared over the two days which I’m not going to try and summarise here. Besides which, there’s Ukgc12.posterous.com for that.

For my #weeklyblogclub post this week, here are a few of my favourite bits from the two days. I will probably blog about some other favourites when I get time.

Notable stuff from some of the sessions I attended:

• Introductions

  • On Friday, more than 200 people introduced themselves in less than half an hour, saying who they were, where they were from, and why they were there.
  • There weren’t quite as many present on Saturday, which I preferred as it felt less daunting.
  • I thought the most telling intro comment was: “I want to be with people who are actually interested for a change.”

• Mobile-friendly WordPress led by Terence Eden:

  • Lots of people access the web using their mobile ‘phone. 50% of new phones being bought NOW are not smartphones, and most contracts are a minimum of 18 months.
  • We MUST publish web sites which are mobile-friendly.
  • Actions for me:
    • To make my own blog mobile-friendly I need to install a plug-in
    • But I can’t install plug-ins on my current web version of WordPress.
    • I need to get my blog hosted so I can install WordPress on my desktop
  • Terence Eden has lots more tips on his blog: http://shkspr.mobi/blog/

• Open data as a ‘business model’ led by John Sheridan

  • Birmingham civic dashboard via Simon Whitehouse is a great example of open data serving a useful purpose.
  • Redbridge Datashare is a good example of a local government open data ‘vehicle’
  • Most memorable comment about CSV as a format for open data: “I know its not as useful, but it’s what I can use”
  • Legislation.gov.uk via John Sheridan is free to use, and has a technical API. John advocates releasing an API as a way to engage with businesses and developers
  • Chris Taggart’s advice to a small housing association when asked what’s in it for them: sharing data with others will give you a critical mass, enabling you to also benefit from their data.
  • There was a bit of discussion about whether ‘business model’ was the best term to use – someone suggested ‘service model’ as an alternative
  • Billions are being spent on rail as an essential piece of strategic national infrastructure. Compare this with the tens of millions that would cost to sort out the issue of data derived from Ordnance Survey, which is a significant obstacle to publication of open data by public sector organisations.
  • Catherine Howe – we won’t grown economically without having the data to leverage. Existing business models are being disrupted, but we aren’t providing the environment in which their replacements will arise
  • Chris Taggart – biggest data owners in the world are the social networking companies. Either open data or massively closed data – big companies can afford to buy up others
  • Me – perhaps open data can be likened to the air we breathe.  It’s available for free, but it’s up to individuals what they do with it (climb mountains, run businesses, or watch telly)
  • Group consensus that open data clauses should be ‘baked in’ to contracts and that government should provide standard ‘boiler plate’ text to save lots of organisations from having to make it up themselves

• The LinkedGov Extension for Google Refine - Dan Smith

I first met Dan about a year ago. I had taken a busman’s holiday for a couple of days and was on a course with Talis in Birmingham entitled: “Introduction to the web of linked data”. Dan was on the same course. I was ok for about two thirds of it, but struggled when it came to coding and Dan helped me out a bunch of times. It came as no surprise on Friday to learn that Dan had developed a fantastic tool. Here are a few notes I took during his presentation :

• LinkedGov is a community project siming to make public data more usable
• There are currently lots of steps involved  converting data to linked data: cleaning, correcting typos, improving access via APIs, improving metadata, using online repositories for facts and figures, using online definitions, and enriching…
• Dan gave a quick overview of Google Refine, a tool for working with messy data, clean it, transform it, extend it and link it. It’s free, and runs in any browser
• Some of the terminology used in Google Refine is complicated
• The LinkedGov extension allows the users to do more for themselves.
• Typing Wizards prompt users to answer questions:
  • Dates and time
  • Measurements
  • Geo location
  • Addresses
  • Other wizards:
    • Columns to rows
    • Rows to columns
    • Blank values
    • Codes and symbols

• It’s open source, so people will be able to build their own wizards
• There’s the potential to develop sector-specific wizards (e.g. just for local gov)
• Potentially save a history of what you have previously done, and then reapply the same changes to the next batch (could be useful with regular data refreshes)
• Dan’s presentation on slideshare
• The hosted version will be made available very soon

• QR CODES – led by Terence Eden

  QR or ‘Quick Response’ codes are variants on bar codes. Most smartphones now are able to ‘see’ the codes through their camera lens, and a QR Code reader on the ‘phone converts the code into an instruction to do something.
• There are lots of uses for QR codes, including:
  • Open a web URL i.e. a web page you specify (making sure it’s mobile-friendly of course!)
  • Dial a phone number (make sure it’s in international format i.e. +44)
  • Send an email to an address you specify
  • SMS – send a text message (can include keywords)
  • vCard – electronic version of a business card
  • vCal (goes straight to your calendar e.g. for an event)
  • wifi login (saves attendees at events having to enter wifi user id and password)

1st attempt at a QR code with a practical use

I had played with QR codes a while ago and tried embedding an image in a QR code. I tried setting it with a link to the Hampshire’s Facts and Figures web pages and it seemed to scan quite well with my iPhone.

I plucked up the courage to show the group and it didn’t seem to go down too badly, although the page it links to isn’t designed for mobiles. Terence  suggested keeping the code edges straight, and I really should have used black rather than the dark blue I had chosen.

We had a good discussion about creative ways of using QR codes. We looked at a few interesting examples include:

• baking them in to cup cakes
• using them for shopping (John Lewis have done this in Brighton, and Tesco have them in subways in South Korea).

I really hope there’s a full #localgovcamp in the Summer. I’m happy to volunteer to help with arrangements.

In the meantime I’m looking forward to LocalGovCamp North West in Preston on Saturday 4th Feb.

That’s all I’ve got time to post today – sorry to have gone on a bit. I just want to finish by thanking @lesteph @davebriggs and @hadleybeemam, the sponsors, and anyone else involved in organising such a great event.

Tracks, Maps, and Apps

I got the idea of blogging about maps and apps a couple of weeks ago whilst reading Louise Brown’s fascinating first post for the #weeklyblogclub entitled: “How will I be using technology in 2012″. I’m interested in technology – not for the sake of it – but where it can be used to solve practical every day problems, or make life a little bit easier.

I’m not quite ready to blog about work as I don’t think I’ve relaxed in to my own style of writing yet. I’m fascinated by Phil Jewitt’s ‘Life Leak’ whereby: “Over time, the contents of a bloggers head gradually transfer into the pages and posts of their blog.” I’m convinced he’s right, and really look forward to reading more from him about that.

In the meantime, this week’s post from me is about walking, and maps, and iPhone apps.

Tracks

Walking is one of my hobbies, particularly over long distances. Over the years I’ve backpacked in Australia, tramped in New Zealand, clambered up Kilimanjaro and trekked an Inca Trail.

Closer to home and less exotically, during spare weekends I like to catch a train to somewhere distant and then walk home again. In my really fit days I was doing over 30 miles in a day. I don’t do that very much nowadays – in 2011 my longest day walk was Salisbury to Winchester which is around 24 miles, but it’s still a pretty respectable distance.

It’s just as well walking’s a hobby, as I don’t use a car and travel everywhere by public transport. I catch the train every day for work, and walk the several miles to the station. When there’s time I walk back again, or otherwise catch the bus. It helps to keep the pounds from piling on as quickly as they otherwise would, and I use the “slow time” to plan the next day or reflect on the one just gone.

Maps

I carry Ordnance Survey Landranger maps when walking in the UK, particularly for longer distances. I’ve had some of my favourite maps for so long that they’re barely legible, and have been patched many times. What a wonderful invention Sellotape was for a world dependent on paper.

That said, however, in the last couple of years I’ve been using a bit of tech as well as paper: I frequently use my iPhone to find a destination, identify a route, measure distance and estimate time. If trains or buses are involved, I also use it to check timetables, locate bus stops and check departures. I’ve tried quite a few map and travel apps and in the remainder of this post I’ve listed some of the iPhone and iPad mapping and travel apps I’ve tried – viewed from a walker’s perspective.

Apps

Google Maps & Compass

Google Maps is probably the first app that most people think of for maps. It works well for roads and offers the usual choice of Standard, Satellite, Hybrid and List which will be familiar to desktop users. I tend to use it in urban areas, particularly for walking in London between two points, post codes or addresses.

Google - not so great in the countryside

Google - great for walking in the city

It’s not very good at recognising footpaths, however, and usually directs you via roads.

I hardly ever use it in more rural areas and don’t use the public transport option at all – According to Google there never seem to be any buses, at least where I’m going.

Road Tour South East England OS Maps 1:50k

You’ve got to really want an app for walking to stump up the £11.99 for this app. I did, and I don’t regret it (I partly justify the cost to myself on the basis that it runs on both iPhone and iPad, and I do use it frequently).

Ordnance Survey iPhone Map

OS 1:50k Landranger Map for iPhone

If you use printed maps from Ordnance Survey, then OS Maps 1:50k will look pretty familiar.

Across the UK there are around a dozen areas to pick from with a separate app for each one. I have  the South East and South West of England.

Create a Track

I really like the fact that it doesn’t rely on the mobile network, with the maps residing on the ‘phone. As a result they are really quick to load, and remain visible even when the phone isn’t connected to a network.

There’s a gazetteer so you can search for a place name, grid ref or Lat Long, which is also extremely fast.

You can create tracks yourself by selecting points on the map and the app will calculate the distance. It’s a little fiddly plotting a route on the iPhone screen, but perfectly do-able with a bit of practice.

Memory-Map

I’ve included Memory Map here as it has some features which I really like – such as recording a route as you walk it, and a comprehensive dashboard.It’s also really easy to plot a route, particularly on iPad.  A mobile only license for for up to 25,000 sqkm from anywhere in GB is currently from £12.50, making it another pricey choice.

Memory-Map for iPad

Unfortunately I found it more annoying than useful when out walking as it loads map panels piecemeal, and I kept having to activate or reactivate panels – really impractical unless there’s great network coverage.

In my opinion this app is best used on an iPad in a location with good wireless and broadband coverage. I ended up deleting it from my iphone to save space.

Cycle Streets

I’m only an occasional cyclist, but I really like Cycle Streets. What’s more, it’s free.

I use it to help select a route for walking on roads and will often use its rather neat facility to select quietest – versus fastest or balanced – route.

Cyclestreets - a great app which runs in a browser

Whilst I prefer a public footpath any day, a quiet road route is sometimes a good substitute, particularly when it’s muddy. With Cyclestreets there’s an app but the browser version works really well as well – in fact, if anything, I prefer it. With even poor network coverage the browser version runs quickly. It also looks great.

UK Train Times by Agant Ltd

UK Train Times - Live Departures screen shot

UK Train Times - Live Departures screen shot

At £4.99 this is a bit pricey but it’s simple to use, very reliable, and fast. Features include Live departures and arrivals for favourite stations, a friendly journey planner which remembers your recent journeys and – nice touch this – ‘next train home’ from wherever you are.

traveline south & east By Malcolm Barclay

In my opinion this app is great value at 69p. It’s got a comprehensive journey planner – basically the same as it’s web cousin – which lets you select departure / arrival times, modes of transport, walking speed & maximum walking time .

traveline south & east screenshot

traveline south & east screenshot

Having set your preferences and clicked ‘Get Journey Plans’ you then see a list of options which lead to a detailed itinerary for each option.

It also ties in with NextBuses which is presented as an icon within the same app.

Footnote: What, No Open data?

If you’ve made it this far and you’re wondering why there’s no mention of apps which use open data, I do intend to blog about that separately once I’ve done a bit more research.

If you know of any open data travel apps that you like I’d really like to hear from you.