Archive for the ‘e-Government’ Category

….or at least that’s the fancy title of the pilot project we’re running with funding from the department for Communities and Local Government. As announced by Hazel Blears, Birmingham is one of ten English councils who secured funding for a ‘Timely Information for Citizens’ pilot project.

The idea behind ‘Birmingham – Open City’ is to develop a community of practice around developing new resources to empower citizens. When Digital Birmingham were working up the bid we went on the basis that we shouldn’t presume what kind of services could be developed, or indeed, what kind of data sources could be made available to develop them. Instead we’re focusing on putting some resource into generating the collaborations, discussions, creativity and debate from which new services can spring.

More – Birmingham – Open City

… then what would it be? Okay, I’ll narrow that down a bit: if you could remove a government-imposed obstacle to allow Birmingham City Council to help you improve the sustainability of your community, what would that be? More – If you could change one thing…

2008 saw a lot of movement around the opening up of public data and particularly in relation to location based services using that data.  We’d already seen some positive signs with the commission of the Power of Information report back in 2007 and last year saw the innovative Show Us A Better Way competition.

It was very interesting to see that all five ideas which Show Us A Better Way are hoping to help develop are ones which use geographic data, especially as there have been so many issues with public sector bodies “misusing” Ordinance Survey data and derived data.  Anybody interested in this would find it useful to take a look at the Guardian’s Free Our Data campaign.  Of course, a cynic might think that the whole competition was devised to apply pressure to open up OS data to public bodies. More – 2009 – A Public Sector Data Explosion?