Jason Hare's Data Management Blog

The other day, I flooded a customer website licensed for 75 datasets with 318 additional in five minutes while using the OpenDataSoft ArcGIS Harvester. Yup. I did that. I felt not so much like “Darth Vader” as much as I did “Dark Helmet” (Rick Moranis in Spaceballs, see below if this reference goes over your head). I was using OpenDataSoft’s ArcGIS Harvester. It’s still in private beta, but will likely be available by the end of December (consider it a Christmas gift to you!) for data publishing. Luckily, the Harvester also came with a delete button so the customer was not affected. I took the usual ribbing from my co-workers. David Thoumas added that we do not need “too many datasets”. I was awed with the power of the Harvester. I had seen it work a year ago and take most of an afternoon to mine data. I innocently put the root of the GIS server into the Harvester, and suddenly it was pulling in data at “Ludicrous Speed”. Ian Henshaw noted we hit hyper drive...

I was invited to attend the Round Table on Data Quality in Open Data held at the White House in Washington, D.C. on April 27th, 2016. The round table was the second in a series of four meetings around the open data initiative sponsored by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and the Center for Open Data Enterprise. This round table was intended to bring together experts to advise the White House Office of Science and Technology on how best to address data quality. DATA QUALITY IS AN ISSUE THAT THREATENS THE VIABILITY OF OPEN DATA Project Open Data is designed to make data held by government agencies more accessible to the public as a way to promote transparency in government operations and to promote business through the incorporation of open data into commercial products. The April 27th round table focused on the issue of data quality in open data. DATA QUALITY IS A GLOBAL PROBLEM In September 2014, Martin Doyle wrote an article for Business2Community on ...

Are we convening a community? The US Nodes have voiced their opinion. Second annual report  celebrates hitting reach, influence and impact targets The ODI has announced that it has been awarded a grant of $4.1m from  Omidyar Network , aimed at creating value from open data across the world. Most of the nodes in the US decided to close because the new unfranchise model from the ODI was not financially viable. Some nodes felt that the ODI was competing with their own nodes in regards to opportunities for working on open data tenders. The former US ODI nodes have decided to convene a congress and create a network of nodes in the US that champion the "convening of a community" around open data. A US Open Data Congress could define how to choose a platform provider, how to choose and evaluate business services around the open data programs and provide guidance beyond transparency. We l...

The US Congress is working on Open Data legislation to protect current Open Data policy. While this all sounds good, it is also important to lay out a clear picture of what has been done so far to detect the right Open Data legislation opportunities. THIS ALL SOUNDS GREAT Congress is stepping up to protect Open Data! When I read this I was struck by two feelings: Elation, and Surprise. The Center for Data Innovation published the who and what of this legislation on April 16, 2016. Quoting from the article: Sponsored by Representatives Derek Kilmer (D-WA) and Blake Farenthold (R-TX) in the House and Senators Brian Schatz (D-HI) and Ben Sasse (R-NE) in the Senate, the bill would make changes to the U.S. Code to institutionalize open data best practices, such as publishing government data, by default, using open and machine readable formats and with an open license that imposes no restrictions on reuse. “Open by default” has been a mainstay of the open data movement for years, and for...

I thought I was done with Open Data in the late Spring of 2015. I had experienced severe brain trauma from an accident and penned my retirement letter on my blog the same day Mike Bracken left the UK’s Government Digital Service. So why did I come back? Mostly because I have recovered. But I also came back because I believe that there is a superior product to deliver data storytelling. That product is OpenDataSoft. I have spent the last half-decade as an open data pundit. I worked hard to keep my comments agnostic to the technology. But OpenDataSoft's platform, work culture and ethics won me over. I am a believer, and I believe the best Open Data Platform solution is OpenDataSoft. If you live in the US and have something to do with Open Data then you probably know my name. Among the American Open Data portals I have built are the City of Raleigh, City and County of Durham, Gainesville, Roseville, Newark, Rutgers and now the Town of Chapel Hill. We may have met at the World...

I thought I was done with Open Data in the late Spring of 2015. I had experienced severe brain trauma from an accident and penned my retirement letter on my blog the same day Mike Bracken left the UK’s Government Digital Service. So why did I come back? Mostly because I have recovered. But I also came back because I believe that there is a superior product to deliver data storytelling. That product is OpenDataSoft. ABOUT JASON HARE   This is me at Colorado’s GoCode Civic Engagement Event. I helped to build the program and worked as a mentor. Photo by 23 Studios. I have spent the last half-decade as an open data pundit. I worked hard to keep my comments agnostic to the technology. But OpenDataSoft’s platform, work culture and ethics won me over. I am a believer, and I believe the best Open Data Platform solution is OpenDataSoft...

From the Cincinnati Enquirer @2008 The Yu and Robinson article "The New Ambiguity of 'Open Government'" was something I read a few years ago. I disagree that the edge of open government is going away. Yes there are data sets being published that have nothing to do with accountability. Yes there are open data initiatives that stand up a few data sets and call it "open". This does not mean that all or most open data professionals do this. This whole line of "government versus the people" is one of the reasons Public Sector Agencies (PSA's) have trouble getting open data initiatives launched in the first place. The main issue is the disconnect between PSAs and the private sector. There is little, if any, discussion on the value-add of releasing these data. This is not purely a government issue. Private sector, with a few shining exceptions (BuildingEye for example) have shied away from using or even trying to use these data. PSAs see this lack of ...