UK needs open data champions, says Martha Lane Fox

abernard102@gmail.com 2013-11-03

Summary:

The UK’s digital champion, Martha Lane Fox, has called for government, businesses and charities to promote the innovative use of open data. Other countries have shown how developers can use openly published data to create applications that benefit society and the economy.  But the examples seen in the UK so far are on a small scale and need to be broadened out to reach a wider audience, Martha Lane Fox told Computer Weekly.  'Open data is such a fundamental part, I believe, of how we move the digital economy on and how we can engage people who have not yet been engaged,' she said.

Her comments came as consultants McKinsey predicted the growth of open data had the potential to add $3tn a year to the global economy.  Lane Fox identified start-up company Mastadon C – which has worked with Openhealthcare UK to identify £200m in potential savings by analysing prescription data – as an 'incredible example' of what could be achieved with open data.  But she said the benefits of open data were not yet widely understood by politicians, businesses and the public in general ... The UK needs to do more to disseminate the right skills to exploit open data, she said. That would mean government, charities and social enterprises working together to help non-specialists make use of publicly available data ... The public sector in the UK has moved to the point where releasing data to the public is now the default, rather than withholding it, Lane Fox said. An open data index, published this week by the Open Knowledge Foundation, ranks the UK and the US as the most open with government data, from a list of 70 countries.  But open data needs constant vigilance, she said ..."

Link:

http://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240208152/UK-needs-open-data-champions-says-Martha-Lane-Fox

From feeds:

Open Access Tracking Project (OATP) » abernard102@gmail.com

Tags:

oa.new oa.psi oa.comment oa.advocacy oa.uk oa.reports oa.economic_impact oa.government oa.data

Date tagged:

11/03/2013, 08:33

Date published:

11/03/2013, 03:33