The Open Data Movement

The VPC has advised many projects in the past that deal with data collection or publishing. Most of the objectives of these projects align with the objectives of a larger movement called the Open Data Movement. The Open Data Movement is a movement that aims to publish local, regional, and national data, with the hopes that people / organizations will use that data for their benefit. The types of data being published can be anything that might be of use to society, ranging from weather, traffic, tourist information, business, political, and geographical data (Gurstein, Michael B. 2011).

The benefits of making data open can be broken down into three sub-categories: Political / social, economic, and technical. The political benefits range from transparency of government operations, accountability, insights into the public sector, and equal access of data for everyone, regardless of social status. Economic benefits, such as availability of info to investors, and stimulation of competitiveness, could be of more importance for the VPC with the decline of local business and jobs in venice. Finally, the technical benefits are that by reusing data (not having to recollect data someone else might have already collected), optimizations can be made to administrative and research processes, resulting in time and money saved (The EU estimates they can save billions every year through open data related optimizations) (Janssen, Marijn, Yannis Charalabidis, and Anneke Zuiderwijk 2012; “Benefits of Open Data”).

There are many new companies that are working to advance the Open Data Movements objectives, a good example being a UK-based firm called Arup. Arup is an independent company consisting of designers, planners, engineers, and technical experts, with the mission of using open data to help solve the world’s problems. The projects they’ve worked on address questions such as: How do you preserve an architectural icon for future generations?, How do you sustainably and competitively shape a city’s port to fulfil its role at the centre of the economy?, and How do you breathe new life into one of London’s busiest streetscapes? (Arup). By leveraging traffic, planning, natural hazards and other topics, Arup is able to “deliver more efficient services and help mitigate against risks, for example of natural disasters” (Charlotte Jee).

With these benefits also come some barriers that could potentially hinder the open data movement’s success. The primary barrier to be aware of is the risk that users won’t have enough incentive or awareness of the available data, won’t utilize it, and won’t benefit from its publishing. Along those lines, information quality is critical to ensure proper extrapolation, and maintain trust by the parties using the data. Some of the technical barriers typically encountered are lack of supporting infrastructure, fragmentation of data, and legacy data formats (issues the VPC has communicated are of importance to address during our IQP). It’s crucial to recognize these barriers because the same barriers that apply to the open data movement will most likely be issues for the VPC in it’s mission to create a hub for Venetian open data (Janssen, Marijn, Yannis Charalabidis, and Anneke Zuiderwijk 2012).

Citations:

"Arup." . Accessed September 19th, 2017. https://www.arup.com.

"Benefits of Open Data." . Accessed Sept 17, 2017. https://www.europeandataportal.eu/en/using-data/benefits-of-open-data.

Charlotte Jee. "19 Innovative UK Companies using Open Data" . Accessed September 19th, 2017. https://www.techworld.com/picture-gallery/startups/-innovative-uk-companies-using-open-data-3613884/.

Gurstein, Michael B. "Open Data: Empowering the Empowered Or Effective Data use for Everyone?" First Monday 16, no. 2 (2011).

Janssen, Marijn, Yannis Charalabidis, and Anneke Zuiderwijk. "Benefits, Adoption Barriers and Myths of Open Data and Open Government." Information Systems Management 29, no. 4 (2012): 258-268.