Open Data & The Civic Network

A basic understanding of the principles and culture of open data are often the most critical elements needed to catalyze broad data release by a government, but having a vision for how that data can be part of a global ecosystem of applications and analysis is also important to help sustain and guide an open data initiative into the future. This long term vision is particularly important to graduate to higher classes of data release: from PDFs and HTML to raw data and then on to standardized APIs and linked data. The reality is that sometimes the value of open data isn't even realized until it's made available in standardized machine readable formats. This talk will examine a few case studies including Open311, the General Transit Feed Specification (GTFS), and DemocracyMap to demonstrate how information that was already publicly available can help bring transformative change when made available in standardized formats by governments around the world. Ultimately, we can begin to sketch out a civic network that connects us to common datasets across borders in a decentralized way just like the web itself.

Transcript

1. Philip Ashlock | CivicAgency.org | BC Open Data Summit 2013 Open Data & The Civic Network
3. Civic Agency
4. Civic Infrastructure
5. UBC – N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N N . December ,
9. GTFS (General Transit Feed Specification)
16. An open communication standard for public services & local government Open311
29. Boston NYC Portland Pisburgh Reinventing the Wheel Should everyone have a custom app? Or just different branding?
31. • Governments can’t easily manage these different apps and communication channels. • People don’t always have clear expectations set for whether government can respond or act. • Many apps aren’t actually connected to the official government CRMs. • Most apps aren’t compatible with one another and everyone has a different app. Problems with proliferation
32. Distributed innovation API API API Standards establish platforms of collaboration
33. Interoperability Consistency Ubiquity Efficiency Shareability Benefits of an open standard
34. API PC / Web SaaS Cloud Integration CRM SMS Tablet Mobile Web Smart Phone Voice IVR
35. • Governments can beer manage how apps connect and how they are used. • Governments can provide automated responses and set more accurate expectations for addressing the issue. • Many different apps and communication channels can simultaneously connect to the official CRM. • With many apps and services working interoperably using the same API, people and government have more choice. Benefits of a web API
36. Open311 GeoReport v2 Established March 2011
37. Edmonton Vancouver Portland San Francisco New York City Washington D.C. Toronto Chicago Boston Baltimore Miami Philadelphia Seattle Bloomington New Orleans Tuscon New Haven Grand Rapids See http://wiki.open311.org/GeoReport_v2/Servers St Louis Houston
38. Barnet Southampton Cebu Helsinki See Map of North America Open311 Worldwide Dominican Republic Darwin Bonn
39. ~ 35 city endpoints ~ 10 vendor supported products ~ 5 open source servers ~ 7 open source clients ~ 6 client libraries For details see: http://wiki.open311.org/GeoReport_v2/Servers http://wiki.open311.org/GeoReport_v2/Support http://wiki.open311.org/GeoReport_v2/Resources Open311 GeoReport v2 Stats
41. Innovation from the Open311 Community
44. Open311 Dashboard
45. Open311 on uReport CRM from Bloomington
54. GeoReport v2 Service Requests Inquiry v0.1 FAQ Knowledgebase Open311 Specifications ✓ ✓ ✓ Ideation: Answers/suggestions
58. GeoWeb DNS / LoST http://api.democracymap.org
59. www.citysdk.eu pdxcitysync.org my.usa.gov
66. Civic Agency phil@civicagency.org / @civicagency Philip Ashlock / @philipashlock
67. Aribution Forward on Climate Rally photo by 350org on Flickr (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0) Vote Icon by Jens Windolf, from The Noun Project (CC BY 3.0)