All posts in the topic First Press Mention of the Open Data Catalogue (Short link)

From: Glen Barnes Date: 2009 Jun 23 09:14 NZST Short link

Pretty good article in Computer World this week -
http://computerworld.co.nz/news.nsf/news/FD90B704E69DCF18CC2575DD0018032A

Apparently if was front page on the print edition.
    

Glen

From: Julian Carver Date: 2009 Jun 23 09:49 NZST Short link

Yes, just saw this. Nicely balanced and representing the challenges well.
Great work Glen, Vikram and Nat for the quotes.

My sense is that given the degree to which the Digital Strategy was seen by
National as very much a Cunliffe/Labour thing, the decimation of SSC e-govt
staff, and the line by line reviews/value for money focus, there's a real
risk that agencies will slow down open access and cross agency dataset
federation initiatives.

I'm seeing some of it still happening at a sectoral level in the
science/environment sector, and MoRST, DOC and others have some real
enthusiasm for it.

I wonder that along with the investment that other countries are making in
this area, there's a strong argument for increased
efficiency/transparency/accountability that will be amenable to National's
policy focus. Do current/past/soon to be past SSC folks have an opinion
about this?

To what extent can it be done from inside Govt (rebuilding e-govt, or
agencies/sectors doing it themselves), to what extent do initiatives like
this need to push/lobby for Government 2.0 at a policy level, and to what
extent do we just get on and do it from the 'outside'?
    

Julian

From: gnat Date: 2009 Jun 23 10:31 NZST Short link

On 23/06/2009, at 9:49 AM, Julian Carver wrote:
> I wonder that along with the investment that other countries are
> making in
> this area, there's a strong argument for increased
> efficiency/transparency/accountability that will be amenable to
> National's
> policy focus. Do current/past/soon to be past SSC folks have an
> opinion
> about this?

(Not SSC, but I have an opinion :-)  I think there are two big reasons
for this government to get into it:
  - transparency is a good thing that creates goodwill.  This is
callous political calculation but true.
  - lowering barriers to reuse government data greases the internal
rails of government

> To what extent can it be done from inside Govt (rebuilding e-govt, or
> agencies/sectors doing it themselves), to what extent do initiatives
> like
> this need to push/lobby for Government 2.0 at a policy level, and to
> what
> extent do we just get on and do it from the 'outside'?

I think you need both inside-out and an outside-in projects.  When
you're inside, you have access, authority, and money rarely available
outside.  When you're outside, you have freedom from the rules and the
politics inside the government (e.g., imagine how hard it would be to
do TheyWorkForYou from within government).

We definitely need to push and lobby for Gov 2.0 at a policy level to
get things happening from within government.  I just sent mail to John
Key pointing out that US, UK, and Australia were all doing a pile of
open data and consultation work under the Gov 2.0 label, but NZ only
has e-government at SSC and that's on life support.  I put my hand up
to help, but honestly I have little hope that anything will come of it.

I'm getting quite frustrated having to watch great things happen
overseas while New Zealand does bugger all.
    

Nat