Open geodata: Opportunities and threats
Ralph Straumann, @rastrau
Ernst Basler + Partner, Zurich
also: Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford
ITSL Workshop March 9, 2016

EBP’s business fields in Switzerland
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EBP’s operational bases
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EBP and data
 We use open data, government-issued and other
 We help government (and private institutions) produce data,
derive data, assess data quality, disseminate data, etc.
 We are project-driven, and so is data we handle – free or not
 We don’t usually publish data
(there’s not really a stock of in-house data)
 We advocate open data policies, e.g. in strategy consulting
 We are an institutional member of Opendata.ch
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«Opportunities and threats»
For who? To whom?
 Private companies?
 Individuals?
 Government and administration?
 Budget?
 Society?
 All end-users?
 ...
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All too common mis-labelling
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http://geolion.zh.ch/opendata

All too common mis-labelling
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OGD = easier data gathering and lowered
entry barriers
 Ex: price for communal geodata:
0–20kCHF per commune
[Buogo & Moullet 2012]
 Data monopolies or oligopolies are
abolished  data not (with)held
by service providers anymore
(e.g. cadastral surveyor, SBB)
 Hence:
Lowered barriers to entering a
market. New data products or
applications become viable.
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License jungle
 Plethora of licenses in federal, cantonal and municipal offices
(and also other data providers, e.g. ODbL for OSM), PD for NaturalEarth)
 License, usage conditions, usage restrictions, requests, ...,
sometimes contradicting
 Licenses that are incompatible with certain uses e.g. OSM
 For some licenses: Virality
 E.g., what is a collective work, what a derived work?
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License jungle: opendata.swiss
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«Data debt» (cf. «technical debt»)
«In the long-term, one of the biggest challenges of Open
Data is not to have the raw data publicly available, but to
provide and consume up-to-date and high quality services
based on the original data. As a consumer, you have to keep in
mind that everything is a cache, as long as you are not the
owner of the data. You are in a dependency chain and you are
not in control of the whole chain.»
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http://geo.ebp.ch/2014/03/31/services-or-raw-data

Data debt and unintended consequences
 App with outdated data: Kataster der belasteten Standorte
(InteractiveThings)
 Refusal of data access: Mailboxes, OSM and Swiss Post
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Data debt
 App with outdated data: Kataster der belasteten Standorte
(InteractiveThings)
 Refusal of data access: Mailboxes, OSM and Swiss Post
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Data debt
 App with outdated data: Kataster der belasteten Standorte
(InteractiveThings)
 Refusal of data access: Mailboxes, OSM and Swiss Post
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Not law – but open data ethics?
Charter for Public Statistics in Switzerland (2014):
e.g., statistics are mandated, respondents give informed consent, data is provided
to the public, etc.
http://www.bfs.admin.ch/bfs/portal/de/index/news/publikationen.html?publicationID=4876
3D Ethics Charter («3D OK»):
e.g., avoid bias, use reliable and current data, document source data, reference
changes in the data, etc.
http://3dok.info/WordPress3/les-principes-de-la-charte/?lang=en
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http://geo.ebp.ch/2014/06/05/open-data-rechte-und-pflichten

Not law – but open data ethics?
Charter for Public Statistics in Switzerland (2014):
e.g., statistics are mandated, respondents give informed consent, data is provided
to the public, etc.
http://www.bfs.admin.ch/bfs/portal/de/index/news/publikationen.html?publicationID=4876
3D Ethics Charter («3D OK»):
e.g., avoid bias, use reliable and current data, document source data, reference
changes in the data, etc.
http://3dok.info/WordPress3/les-principes-de-la-charte/?lang=en
... and OGD?
 Signatories of these kinds of charters are usually official-ish bodies
 How can we achieve commitment of relevant actors?
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http://geo.ebp.ch/2014/06/05/open-data-rechte-und-pflichten

Finances
How should OGD be financed?
 Ex. Swisstopo:
 Geodata dissemination revenue of 13 MCHF vs. production costs of 250-300
MCHF
 Swisstopo’s (FLAG Office; «Führung mit Leistungsauftrag und
Globalbudget») options: compensation, reduction of mandate or of revenue-
to-cost ratio
 Threat for taxpayers (preparatory effort for uncertain gains
through OGD)
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http://opendata.ch/files/2012/07/OGD_Studie_Schlussversion.pdf

Finances
VGI (e.g. OSM) to the rescue?
 various inherent biases in crowdsourced data
 OSM provides a service to the public, not ‘service public’ (in the
Swiss sense)
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http://geo.ebp.ch/2014/06/25/operational-use-of-crowdsourced-data-energic-workshop-presentation
http://geo.ebp.ch/2014/09/19/the-data-workers-manifesto

Finances
VGI (e.g. OSM) to the rescue?
 biases in crowdsourced data
 OSM provides a service to the public, not ‘service public’
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http://geo.ebp.ch/2014/06/25/operational-use-of-crowdsourced-data-energic-workshop-presentation
http://geo.ebp.ch/2014/09/19/the-data-workers-manifesto

Finances
VGI (e.g. OSM) to the rescue?
 various inherent biases in crowdsourced data
 OSM provides a service to the public, not ‘service public’ (in the
Swiss sense)
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http://geo.ebp.ch/2014/06/25/operational-use-of-crowdsourced-data-energic-workshop-presentation
http://geo.ebp.ch/2014/09/19/the-data-workers-manifesto

«Hacksploitation» and sustainable impact
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http://brianchang.info/2016/02/28/hackathon-be-gone.html

«Hacksploitation» and sustainable impact
«Entsorgung Zürich» app (citizen) vs. «Sauberes Zürich» app
(government)
«Trainshare» app (citizen) vs. «SBB-CONNECT» (gov-owned entity)
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http://opendata.ch/pressearchiv/offener-brief-zur-smartphone-app-sauberes-zuerich
http://trainshare.ch

Finally
 Confusion of terms: What are we talking about even?
 In our projects, OGD can make data gathering more efficient
 OGD affords newly viable applications and data products
 More competition and innovation over rent-seeking
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Finally, finally
 Lack of legal knowledge: License jungle, license-application conflicts
 Know-how transfer, legal consultation
 Best practices for data providers/license issuers
 Simple, universally adopted geodata licenses
 Data debt and liability
 Technical solutions
 Legal implications?
 Open data ethics?
 Financing OGD
 Political solutions
 Hackathons and intellectual property
 Prior clarification of intellectual property
 Open data ethics and community management
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Contact, follow-ups
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Ralph Straumann
Ernst Basler + Partner
www.ebp.ch
www.geo.ebp.ch
ralph.straumann@ebp.ch @rastrau