In Praise of Open Postcodes - Open Enterprise

"As we now know, the privatisation of the Post Office was a financial fiasco that cost the UK public the better part of a billion pounds. But one other disastrous aspect of the sale that is usually overlooked is the fact that the main postcode database is now privately owned, and thus unlikely ever to enter the public domain for all to use. That's a big loss for open geolocation data, since postcodes are a hugely important way of referring to places and people. Incredibly, it seems that Ireland is not only failing to learn from the UK's mistakes, but making some new ones of it own as it brings its postcode system, Eircode: 'Eircodes will help the public, businesses and public bodies to locate every individual address in the State. Eircodes will bring many benefits to the daily lives of people, householders and businesses. Currently, around 35% of addresses - mainly in rural areas - do not have a unique name or number in their address. With Eircodes, delivery of services and goods will be much easier and quicker to these addresses.'  Here's a list of criticisms of the planned approach ..."