Comments on: Data are news

By: niksilver.com » An ABC of R2: E is for education tables

niksilver.com » An ABC of R2: E is for education tables — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 09:31:08 +0000

[...] not just text, nor just audio and video, but also — as people like Adrian Holovaty and Jeff Jarvis have long said — managing and exposing data. This is one example of how that can [...]

By: niksilver.com » Buzzmachine goes clunk: When media companies do tech

niksilver.com » Buzzmachine goes clunk: When media companies do tech — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 19:11:54 +0000

[...] is a shame really, because you’re suddenly finding you want to allow your readers to slice and dice some scandalous schools data, and you could make use of Google AppEngine if only you had someone with Python [...]

By: Jeff Jarvis

Jeff Jarvis — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 10:46:57 +0000

For us at a high school level, it’s the paper that usually gathers it.

By: Ian Betteridge

Ian Betteridge — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 08:55:46 +0000

“If we put out all our sports data as tables…”

One quick point: as I found out to my cost years ago, much sports data (like league tables, for example) is actually the copyright of the relevant league, at least in the UK. I suspect it’s the same for data like batting averages, goals scored, etc.

By: Charles Arthur

Charles Arthur — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 21:49:12 +0000

@Tom: it’s a deal.

By: Tom Loosemore

Tom Loosemore — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 17:00:00 +0000

Back in 1998 when we launched UpMyStreet.com we had to reverse engineer the UK’s school league tables from the Windows Help File format via which the Government had published them on the Web in order to limit re-use.

We were refused access to the school league tables given to newspapers as tabulated data on a CD. Including the Guardian. I doubt much has changed other than there is now an open click licence allowing a wide range of re-use of such crown copyright data.

So yup, Charles, I’ll go hunt down some school league table data for you amid the jungle of Government, just so long as you wander across the office to the Guardian’s education desk, and see what your colleagues already have (10 years worth, in theory…)

By: Kevin Marks

Kevin Marks — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 16:32:09 +0000

Charles, you publish the league tables in the paper, don’t the govt send you them digitally? If so, why not publish them on the Guardian website in a mashable format too?

By: Charles Arthur

Charles Arthur — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 15:21:16 +0000

Well, a couple of things arising.
First, the government doing this has arisen from Gdn Technology’s Free Our Data campaign - we’ve been plugging at it for two years, and for the past year had terrific support from government, especially Tom Watson, who is now making it happen.

Second, the school league tables are government data - and it’s weird that they aren’t in downloadable form (or even API form).

Third, in this instance “WWGD” could be deconstructed as “What Would the Guardian Do?” Becoming a platform is one of our aims.. as recent hirings might hint.