The document discusses the importance of open data in local governance and how it empowers citizens to hold public bodies accountable. It presents a DIY approach to creating a personal data store, emphasizing steps for requesting and publishing data without requiring programming skills or funding. The process involves utilizing online tools like WhatDoTheyKnow, Google Docs, and WordPress to manage and share collected information effectively.

1. DIY Data StoreWMRO #wmod10 event15July 2010William Perrin - william@talkaboutlocal.orgTalk About Local (West Midlands) Ltdhttp://talkaboutlocal.org/faqWilliam Perrin TAL

2. 1984 - Freedom of Information Campaign starts up

3. Gordon BrownTim Berners-Lee2009

4. Maintain momentum

6. "Getting council business out in the open will revolutionise local government. Local people should be able to hold politicians and public bodies to account over how their hard earned cash is being spent and decisions made on their behalf. They can only do that effectively if they have the information they need at their fingertips. Organisations that might have been effectively locked out before, including voluntary sector and small business, will be in a much stronger position to pitch for contracts and bring new ideas and solutions to the table."@dominiccampbell "there are no rules, we want to see what you can do, your innovation" - @ericpickles #localgov

10. The ‘Crackavan’Rufford Street c2002In front of my housePics – Mark Bailey

11. Public Sector Information in actionBrand new street light broken for 163 daysSomeone isn’t living up to contractFrom snagging to failureCan performance data help hold to account?

12. 2007-2008 Took a lifetime to find basic relevant information on webStreet light repair – Islington average 26.5 days v 163 hereLever for getting things doneLight gets fixed due to this and other factors

13. Abandoned cars and weekly arsonBingfield Park, Rufford Street 2002In front of my housePics – Mark Bailey

14. This 2010 open data would have been priceless in 2002 when fighting acute arson problem in Caledonian Ward

15. Towards a DIY datastore – first catch your data

16. Towards a DIY datastore – store your data

17. Towards a DIY datastore – publish links to your data

18. DIY data store: no cash, no programming , no brainerFirst catch your data –www.whatdotheyknow.comFor tips on what data to ask for go to London Data Store and ask your council for what London publishes, in machine readable form such as CSV or excel spreadsheetPut in two requests a day for data citing and linking to Eric Pickles and David Cameron’s statements. Use whatdotheyknow.comAsk in the right way. Either – ask nicely if you think the LA will publish or you have a relationship. Or copy some of my aggressive FOI request language in whatdotheyknow, borrowed from Heather Brooke.Get some mates to help you to spread load and prevent ‘nuisance’ issuesSend an email to the Leader of the Council explaining what you are doing – a common courtesy. Then if the Council plays up, FOI what s/he does with the email internallyStore the data – whatdotheyknow.com and google docsSet up a free Google mail account and use google docs – put CSV data you receive in a Google sheet and click to publish/share the sheet (this gives it a URL accessible over the interweb etc). If they give you pdfs you can store them there too.Publish the dataGo to Wordpress.com and set up a simple free blog, use the standard theme and don’t fanny about making it look prettyCall blog e.g. opendatamidfordshire.wordpress.com – will quickly rise up GoogleGive it a simple title – Midfordshire Data Store – helps with GoogleCreate categories in the blog for the types of data you are requestingAs you get each new piece of data store it in google docs, then write a short blog post explaining what data and what format it is in your wordpress blog, with link to google docs and whatdotheyknow.comTell people about it and get them to link to you