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Outline for Open Data: Let's Lean Forward

Michael Easter

August, 2015

PEI Devs, Charlottetown Yacht Club

This file might help illustrate the arc of the talk for those not in attendance, as the slides in isolation will be pointless.

Open Data (part 1)
  • The presentation, and the new venture, covers a flowering ecosystem, bounty of ideas, etc.
  • However, like a garden, there is hard-work: tilling, fertilizing, weeding, etc.
  • We'll dig into a specific local example.
  • Kerry Campbell tweeted about "10 minutes with a calculator" to sum a column (from PDF).
    • Kerry did the best he could, given the cards he was dealt: a PDF.
    • A calculator, in 2015? Is that an efficient use of our time?
    • How do we know the result is correct? How can we leverage Kerry's work?
  • I took 2 hours to liberate the PDF to a simple comma-separated-value file (CSV).
    • Now it can be imported into a spreadsheet; calculating the sum is trivial and democratized.
    • Finding min/max/average is easy. Further, we can write programs against it: a Google Map mash-up, perhaps. Who knows?
    • With liberated data, we are only limited by our imagination, not by the technology.
  • Three essential elements of Open Data:
    • accessible (online, non-proprietary format)
    • machine readable (PDF is evil)
    • explicit, permissive license
  • I won't publish CSV because PDF wasn't licensed; I don't have time to investigate "fair use", or the default in PEI.
  • gov'ts typically publish "data sets" to a server called a portal or catalogue
    • these sites often have search and basic graphic capabilities
Open Data (part 2)
  • My cousin asked about Open Data, and was asleep 3 minutes into my explanation.
  • Offered him an app example involving health-care for his infant son, and he physically leaned forward in interest. This is precisely civic engagement.
  • I was dealing with fertilizing the garden; my cousin wants the harvest. Apps, visualizations, info-graphics can enlighten, outrage, pique curiosity, etc. People respond to stories.
  • Example: worst parking space in NYC. The talk illustrates a cycle of:
    • data access
    • insight
    • engagement (i.e. leaning forward)
    • taking action
    • effecting change
  • For software developers, we deal with code frameworks all the time. Here, Ben Wellington found a bug in the "civic framework", submitted a patch, and it was accepted. Tremendous satisfaction!
  • Example: farmers in Uganda. No matter if Uganda or Morell, any farmer will lean forward re: crop yields.
  • Example: security cameras in Charlottetown
  • Team Data Mission Statement: a masterpiece
    • Responsibly (i.e. respect privacy concerns)
    • unleash (i.e. convert potential energy between nerds, gov't actors, engaged citizens into kinetic energy / action)
    • ROI (which resonates with business and gov't)
      • we've already invested in the data, re: collection, storage
      • consider economic impact of weather, GPS
Open Data Book Club (intro)
  • circa 2007, a man in Ottawa scraped skating-rink hours from website, created Google Maps mash-up
  • today, Ottawa has full-blown open data culture (the flowery garden)
  • Open Data Book Club:
    • monthly MeetUp of software devs, librarians, gov't reps (aka the blue shirts), citizens
    • each month they study a data set
    • inspired by hack event fatigue
    • present visualizations, hack night (not hackathon), etc
Open Data Book Club (for PEI)
  • I propose that we start one as part of PEI Developers
  • logistics:
    • Fall 2015
    • monthly meeting
    • diverse, as in Ottawa
  • challenge: must fertilize & till the garden
    • advocate Open Data with gov't
    • crowd-source/curate Open Data (We need examples that make people lean forward. They can be compelling, or trite, if fun).
    • spoonful of sugar (apps, visualizations) helps the medicine go down (Open Data agenda)
    • An "app" is application but also an appetizer. We must manage scope.
    • If an idea is too large, act as broker for commercial software shops.
    • bonus: can we help non-profit organizations? seniors? those less fortunate?
    • the plan is fluid, but ideally, meetings consist of:
      • publishers: gov't reps presenting a data set, or describing what is available
      • consumers: nerds & citizens describing a problem that could be solved with a data set
      • presentations of insight from past sessions / data sets. (A goal to provide continuity across sessions.)
    • meetings may also include info sessions on
      • statistics
      • info-graphic design, visualization
      • journalism (e.g. fair use)
      • legal / ethics
      • data science
      • big data
Open Data Book Club (finale)
  • If a 6-year-old girl draws a photo of her community on PEI, she might include a school, fire department, police department, hospital, church ...
  • Her career options include IT as much as medicine, first responder, educator, etc.
  • So, where are we -- the nerds -- in her picture? As a social institution? As a role model?
  • What if there was a maker-space (not addressed here, but would be awesome)
  • What if there was a group that effected change, here on PEI... a Volunteer Data Department?
  • This might be the beginning of something special. Let's lean forward, together!