Open data in Scotland: a blueprint for unlocking innovation, collaboration and impact

Footnotes

1 2024-25 Scottish Budget - Pre-budget Scrutiny Report (2023)

2 Open Knowledge Foundation, Open Definition 2.1 (n.d.).

3 Ubaldi, Barbara. "Open government data: Towards empirical analysis of open government data initiatives." (2013).

4 An open license is one which grants a minimum set of permissions and imposes only certain ‘acceptable’ conditions on use. Open Knowledge Foundation, Open Definition 2.1 (n.d.).

5 Open Government Data Principles, (2007).

6 Davies, T. Open ICT for Development, (n.d), Open Data as Strategy, (2016).

7 Davies, T. et al, (Eds.). The State of Open Data: Histories and Horizons (2019)

8 Verhulst, Stefaan, et al. "The emergence of a third wave of open data: How to accelerate the re-use of data for public interest purposes while ensuring data rights and community flourishing." Available at SSRN 3937638 (2020).

9 The Governance Lab, Toward a Fourth Wave of Open Data? (2023)

10 Data governance is defined by DAMA as: “The exercise of authority, control and shared decision making (planning, monitoring and enforcement) over the management of data assets”. Data governance is therefore important because it defines why and how open data gets published, what the outputs look like, and who is involved in the process. DAMA. Earley, S., et al (Eds.), The DAMA Guide to the Data Management Body of Knowledge (DAMA-DM BOK). (2017).

11 Peixoto defines public transparency as ‘the disclosure of actions taken by public actors and institutions’. Peixoto, Tiago. (2013). The Uncertain Relationship Between Open Data and Accountability. UCLA law review. University of California, Los Angeles. School of Law. 60. 200-213.

12 Deloitte, Assessing the value of TfL’s open data and digital partnerships, (2017)

13 Lord, J. (2019) Open Data and Corporate Ownership. In T. Davies, S. Walker, M. Rubinstein, & F. Perini (Eds.), The State of Open Data: Histories and Horizons. Cape Town and Ottawa: African Minds and International Development Research Centre.

14 Nagaraj, A. ‘The Private Impact of Public Data: Landsat Satellite Maps Increased Gold Discoveries and Encouraged Entry’, Management Science 2022 68:1 (2022)

15 Open Data Institute, The Role of Data in Unlocking the Potential of Social Prescribing

16 National Performance Framework

17 https://data2x.org/state-of-gender-data/financing/

18 International Aid Transparency Initiative, Case Studies

19 Open Data Services, How open data standards can help mitigate climate and disaster risk, (2023).

20 https://theodi.org/insights/reports/measuring-the-impact-of-data-institutions-report/

21 https://os4d.opendataservices.coop/development/research/

22 Robinson, David G. and Yu, Harlan and Zeller, William P. and Felten, Edward W., Government Data and the Invisible Hand (Fall 2009). Yale Journal of Law & Technology, Vol. 11, p. 160, (2009) Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1138083

23 Goëta, S. and Davies, T. (2016) “The Daily Shaping of State Transparency: Standards, Machine-Readability and the Configuration of Open Government Data Policies”, Science & Technology Studies, 29(4), pp. 10–30. doi: 10.23987/sts.60221.

24 Davies, T, Open Data as Strategy, (2016).

25 Open Data Directive

26 Davies, T, High value datasets: an exploration, (2019)

27 OCCRP, Aleph

28 Lämmerhirt, D. & Brandusescu, A. (2019) Issues in Open Data - Measurement. In T. Davies, S. Walker, M. Rubinstein, & F. Perini (Eds.), The State of Open Data: Histories and Horizons. Ahmadi Zeleti, Fatemeh, Rhoda Kerins, and Helena Campbell. "Towards Open Data Impact Evaluation Framework–An Empirical Analysis of the Demand-side Response." (2023).

29 Creating Value through Open Data: Study on the Impact of Re-use of Public Data Resources

30 The UK Government, for example, quantified the cost to businesses of collecting beneficial ownership information, which was published as open data.

31 Ahmadi Zeleti et al, Towards Open Data Impact Evaluation Framework – An Empirical Analysis of the Demand-side Response, Proceedings of the 56th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, (2023)

32 GovLab, Open Data's Impact

33 Dawes, SS, Vidiasova, L, Parkhimovich, O. (2016). Planning and designing open government data programs: an ecosystem approach, Government Information Quarterly, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.giq.2016.01.003

34 Data2X/Open Data Watch, The Data Value Chain: Moving from Production to Impact

35 GovLab identified five major areas that need attention in order to maximise the impact of open data: problem and demand definition, capacity and culture, partnerships, risks, and governance. GovLab, Periodic Table of Open Data’s Impact Factors.

36 Peter A. Johnson, Sarah Greene (2017). Who Are Government Open Data Infomediaries? A Preliminary Scan and Classification of Open Data Users and Products. UWSpace. http://hdl.handle.net/10012/16730

37 Rininta Putri Nugroho Anneke Zuiderwijk Marijn Janssen Martin de Jong (2015), "A comparison of national open data policies: lessons learned", Transforming Government: People, Process and Policy, Vol. 9 Iss 3 pp. 286 - 308

38 Open Government Partnership, Open Data to Improve Transparency and Growth

39 Schultes, Erik, et al. "Reusable FAIR implementation profiles as accelerators of FAIR convergence." International Conference on Conceptual Modeling. Cham: Springer International Publishing, (2020).

40 This is potentially problematic due to its very opinionated nature and lack of room to acknowledge real improvements to ‘average’ data. For example, the transition between two- and three-star data involves shifting tabular data from proprietary to non-proprietary formats but does not account for the enormous potential variance in data quality and utility within a tabular dataset.

41 Open Contracting data can be assessed using an online tool and against key criteria developed against specific use cases. The data quality of major publishers to the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI) Standard is compared in a regular index organised by Publish What You Fund, generated via an open methodology.

42 Open Data Services, Standards Lab Handbook

43 Davies, T, Focussed Futures: the Data Portal as…, (2023)

44 Watt, I. What Is Open Data and Why Does it Matter?, David Hume Institute, (2023)

45 Krishnadas, G. The evolution of our data discoverability solution Dtechtive through the CivTech programme of the Scottish Government, 2023

46 Lord, J. and Kiepe, T. Structured and interoperable beneficial ownership data, Open Ownership, (2022)

47 A number of countries have created open data guides and toolkits in this vein, aimed at addressing common challenges faced by publishers. Kucera, Jan, et al. "Methodologies and Best Practices for Open Data Publication." DATESO. 2015. The Scottish Government has its own open data resource pack that, while somewhat out-of-date, does tackle some of the major issues.

48 Dodds, L. Open Data Institute, Publishers Guide to Open Data Licensing, (2013)

49 Interagency Standing Committee, Operational Guidance on Data Responsibility in Humanitarian Action, 2023.

50 The UK’s Office for National Statistics publishes an extensive collection of methodology documents for its regular publications

51 The World Bank maintains an extensive knowledge base about its open data products and methodologies.

52 Many countries offer a data portal, which can serve multiple roles in the data ecosystem. Research by the Open Data Institute collated a number of design patterns, and anti-patterns, for data portals.

53 The Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation has a dedicated mapping tool.

54 Companies House, for example, develops its APIs for open company information on Github.

55 The helpdesk model is used by most large multi stakeholder open data initiatives to facilitate publication in line with data standards or other quality requirements. Open Data Services, The Helpdesk Model. The World Bank runs a user-facing helpdesk to promote the use and reuse of its open data publications.

56 IATI and Open Referral have healthy online communities of practice that provide ongoing dialogue between various stakeholders. Companies House maintains a more technically-oriented forum for users of its company data products.

57 360Giving and OpenActive both run regular onboarding and adoption calls.

58 This team also manages statistics.gov.scot.

59 Watt, I. What Is Open Data and Why Does it Matter?, David Hume Institute, (2023)

60 Scotland’s OGP commitment on financial transparency as a good example.

61 Postcode to area lookup files are made available in the Scottish Postcode Directory. However property references and address lookups require access to proprietary databases. Owen Boswarva, Thoughts on campaigning for open address data in the UK,(2023). Andy Wightman, Scotland’s Land Information System – what is it and why does it matter?, David Hume Institute, (2023).

62 These levers do exist and can drive genuine improvement, as discussed in Recommendation 3.