5th Communia Workshop: papers and presentations

Accessing, Using, Reusing Public Sector Content and Data

The 5th COMMUNIA workshop, co-organised on 26-27 March by the Open Knowledge Foundation and London School of Economics, focused on how we can unlock the huge potential of public sector material. It also examined the current obstacles to doing this -- legal, technological and social -- as well as how they can be overcome. In particular, much of the value of public sector material can only be realized if it is reused and interlinked -- both activities that are currently difficult for a variety of legal and technological reasons.

Across the world there is a growing recognition of the social and commercial value of public sector content and data: be that the text of laws, the holdings of public museums, or the geospatial and environmental information collected by government agencies. Moreover, it is likely that better access to and use of such information is central to improving governance and increasing democratic participation. Therefore, the event focused around the claim that, wherever possible: Public sector content and data should be made available, both legally and technically, for public re-use.

A range of presentations and policy recommendations from researchers, policy-makers, stakeholders and representatives from Europe, the United States and Australia is available from the download section and by clicking on the presentations titles in the agenda below. Policy recommendations and abstracts are also available as two separated downloadable documents and a full report can be accessed here.
[13apr09]

Programme

26th March

09:30-09:40 - Welcome,

Professor Ian Angell (London School of Economics)

09:40-10:00 - Keynote:

Tom Watson MP (Minister for Digital Engagement and Civil Service Issues), The government view: progress so far

10:00-11:30 - Social and economic value of public sector material

• Jamie Love (Director, Knowledge Ecology International), Governments and databases
• Rufus Pollock (Fellow, University of Cambridge + Director, Open Knowledge Foundation), Economics of Public Sector Information
• Tom Steinberg (Director, mySociety), mySociety
• Michael Nicholson (Deputy Chair, PSI Alliance + Expert Member, APPSI), PSI: State control or Public freedom?

11:30-12:00 - Coffee

12:00-13:30 - Getting the rights right: law and policy

• Mr. Luis Manuel Ferrão (European Commission), The need for an European approach
• Brian Fitzgerald (Queensland University of Technology), Access to PSI: Policy, Law and Technology
• Mireille van Eechoud (IViR), Getting the rights right at the EU level, Does the Public Sector Information Directive Deliver?
• Naomi Korn (JISC SCA Consultant), In from the cold

13:30-14:30 - Lunch

14:30-16:00 - Getting the right tools for the job: technology and communities

• Pierre Guillaume Wielezynski (World Food Programme), Getting bureaucracies to open up - a pragmatic view
• Carol Tullo (Director, OPSI), Unlocking information, engaging communities
• Simon Field (Chief Technology Officer, Office for National Statistics), Making the most of statistical data
• Brian Hoadley (Head of Product Design and Customer Insight, Directgov), Directgov | innovate
• Ton Zijlstra and James Burke (Open government data project commissioned by Ministry for Interior Affairs, Netherlands), Open government data in the Netherlands
• Simon Grice (BeLocal)

16:00-16:30 - Coffee

16:30-18:00 - Discussion and statement

• Facilitated by Jonathan Gray (Open Knowledge Foundation + Royal Holloway)

27th March

09:30-10:00 - Keynote:

Richard Owens, WIPO, WIPO and Access to Content: The Development Agenda and the Public Domain

10:00-11:30 - Public sector content and cultural heritage institutions

• Ben White (British Library), Digitising European Culture: Legal Stasis?
• Tom Moritz (Internet Archive), Full Return on Investment: the case for open access to scientific data and information
• Edward Betts (Open Library), One web page for every book
• Frances Pinter (London School of Economics + Bloomsbury Academic), Open Publishing: Working with the Commercial and Public sectors
• Nadia Arbach (Victoria and Albert Museum), Wikipedia Loves Art
• Paul Gerhardt (Archives for Creativity), Creative Engagement with Broadcast Archives
• Mathias Schindler (Bundesarchiv image collection at Wikimedia Deutschland), Bundesarchiv and Wikimedia Commons
• Hilary Roberts (Imperial War Museum on Flickr Commons), The Imperial War Museum and the Commons on Flickr Armistice Day Project

11:30-12:00 - Coffee

12:00-13:30 - Discussion and statement

• Facilitated by Prodromos Tsiavos (LSE + ENCORE)

13:30-14:30 - Lunch

14:30-18:00 - COMMUNIA Working Groups