Open Data and Data Driven Journalism

Jonathan GrayThe Open Knowledge Foundation

European Journalism Centre24th August 2010

From books to bits...

Digital technologies have thepotential to radically transformthe way that knowledge isdisseminated in our society.

But we still have a long way to go …

- the shadow of the print press- datasets are to illustrate reports- publishing without reuse in mind- culture of asking permission- vast information silos- non-machine readable formats- broken links, vanishing content

Where are we going?

An ecosystem of open data:

- small pieces, loosely joined- easy to reuse, easy to recombine- lots of contributors / maintainers- distributed, decentralised- divide and conquer- innovation / unexpected reuse- iterative, versioned, 'wiki'-like- learning from open source

From legal uncertainty...

… to legal clarity.

Open data: free for anyone to reuse orredistribute for any purpose

What does this mean for journalism?

Making the news:

- finding new stories from datasets- bigger picture by linking datasets- more pairs of eyes to spot patterns- harnessing more external expertise- analysing data behind the stories- responding to interest from public- putting stories into context- publishing datasets with stories

Spreading the news:

- visually representing information- demand-driven delivery- datasets for others to reuse- enabling users to comment/flag- integration with other services- connecting data to stories

What can journalists and mediaorganisations do?

1. Publish data using an open license

2. Work with existing communities

3. Use and support existing initiativesand technologies

4. Keep innovating!

jonathan.gray@okfn.orghttp://twitter.com/jwyg

http://identi.ca/jwyg

Image creditsWork with schools by New York Public LibraryImages by Otto Neurath and the Isotype Institute from FulltablePierre Vivant's Traffic Light Tree by William WarbyThe Green Light by Ted PercivalLego Bricks by bdesham

These slides are available under a Creative Commons Attribution Sharealike License. While most imagesare available under an open license (see above) some are used for illustrative purposes and rights may bereserved by their creators.