1. Using social media to drive public
engagement with Open Data
Andrew Garbett, Dr. ConorLinehan, Dr. Ben Kirman, Dr. Jamie Wardman, Prof. Shaun Lawson

2. Open Data
“ Open Data is a philosophy and practice
requiring that certain data are freely
available to everyone, without restrictions
from copyright, patents or other
mechanisms of
” control.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/open_data

3. “ Open Data may be the most powerful lever of
21st century public policy: it can make
accountability real for citizens; it can improve
outcomes and productivity in key services
through informed comparison; it can transform
social relationships – empowering individuals
and communities; and it can drive dynamic
economic growth.
”
HM Government. 2011. Open Public Services White Paper.

4. Better governance Better economy
openness improves governance through increased Openness permits easier and more rapid reuse of material
transparency and engagement. and open data and content are the key raw ingredients for
the development of new innovative tools and services.
Why is Open Data important?
Better culture Better research
Openness means greater access, sharing and For research to function effectively, and for society
participation in relation to cultural material and to reap the full benefits from research
activities. activities, research outputs should be open.
HM Government. 2011.Making Open Government Data real: a
public consultation.

5. data.gov.uk
Health (NHS spending and performance)
Crime (Police and Crime)
Travel and transport
• Fine granularity
• Consistent in format
• Data for almost all UK

6. Wah?!?!?!

7. "contact_details": {
"telephone": "0116 222 2222",
"email":
"beaumont.lpu@leicestershire.pnn.police.uk
"
},
"name": "New Parks",
"links": [
Public services
{
"url": "http://www.newparks.org.uk",
"description": null,
"title": "New Parks website"
• Members of the public lack the technical
}
],
"centre": {
skills or knowledge to make use of
"latitude": "52.6409",
"longitude": "-1.1828" statistics
},
"description": "<p>This neighbourhood
includes New College, Aikman Avenue
flats, Mossgate and part of the New Parks
Estate (east of the A563 New Parks
We need services created by third
Boulevard) to Fosse Road.</p>n<p>The
area is primarily residential with a parade of
shops on Aikman Avenue and other small party developers
retail outlets within the estate along with two
local neighbourhood pubs.</p>n<p>To find
out more about what's happening in your
local area read your local station <a
href="http://www.leics.police.uk/policing/8_c
ity_bcu/15_beaumont_leys/blog/"
target="_blank">Inspector's monthly
update.</a></p>",
"locations": [
{
"name": "Beaumont Leys",
"longitude": "-1.16936",
"postcode": "LE4 1DS",
"address": "2 Beaumont
WaynLeicester",
"latitude": "52.6677",
"type": "station",
"description": null
}
],
"url_force":
"http://www.leics.police.uk/policing/8_city_bc
u/15_beaumont_leys/35_new_parks/",
"id": "C01",
"population": "16029"

9. Shows bike usage data for 30+ cities

10. MashMyGov.Org
The next best thing is in
here, somewhere …

11. Location based service where you earn awards and badges for ‘checking
Into’ places such as your favourite bar, restaurant or hang out place
You ‘Check In’ using a mobile app and this data is displayed on
foursquare.com which is then available to your friends

12. Personalised UK Crime statistics based on your
location habits, using a Social Media platform
(Foursquare) + UK Government Open Data on
Crime

13. How does it work?
Police API
(data.gov.uk)
http://policeapi.rkh.co.uk
http://developer.foursquare.com
RESTfulAPI calls for data from;
• Foursquare
•Police.uk
Geo-services from;
• Yahoo Placefinder
• Google Maps

15. "contact_details": {
"telephone": "0116 222 2222",
"email":
"beaumont.lpu@leicestershire.pnn.police.uk
"
},
What does it offer?
"name": "New Parks",
"links": [
{
"url": "http://www.newparks.org.uk",
• Police.uk already available
– Provided crime statistics based on user search
"description": null,
"title": "New Parks website"
}
],
"centre": {
"latitude": "52.6409",
},
"longitude": "-1.1828" • We provide crime data, without you having to
"description": "<p>This neighbourhood
includes New College, Aikman Avenue
search, for your everyday life
flats, Mossgate and part of the New Parks
Estate (east of the A563 New Parks
Boulevard) to Fosse Road.</p>n<p>The
area is primarily residential with a parade of
shops on Aikman Avenue and other small • We‟ve „Added Value‟ to the data by personalising
retail outlets within the estate along with two
local neighbourhood pubs.</p>n<p>To find an otherwise meaningless Open Data
out more about what's happening in your
local area read your local station <a
href="http://www.leics.police.uk/policing/8_c
ity_bcu/15_beaumont_leys/blog/"
target="_blank">Inspector's monthly
update.</a></p>",
"locations": [
{
"name": "Beaumont Leys",
"longitude": "-1.16936",
"postcode": "LE4 1DS",
"address": "2 Beaumont
WaynLeicester",
"latitude": "52.6677",
"type": "station",
"description": null
}
],
"url_force":
"http://www.leics.police.uk/policing/8_city_bc
u/15_beaumont_leys/35_new_parks/",
"id": "C01",
"population": "16029"

16. How was FearSquare accepted?
2,000+ Foursquare users
23,000 Unique visitors
45,000 page views
Visitors from 128 countries
1st France (6403)
2nd United States (4055)
3rd UK (3980)
4th Brazil (1957)
5th Canada (1079)
Articles in;
Time Magazine, Discovery Channel, New Scientist
ReadWriteWeb, TechCrunch

17. Impacts of data misrepresentation
“@anon – Apparently a branch of Costa Coffee in
Cambridge is the most bad-ass place on Foursquare
in the UK!”
Developers and data controllers need to be vigilant of how
data is presented so as not to cause a detrimental effect on
third parties

18. What makes useful Open Data?
Developers need data;
• in machine readable formats
• is described with meta-data
• available from a well documented, live online source
(API‟s)
• in the cleanest format (free from prior formatting)
• in the finest granularity available
• able to be filtered based on parameters

19. Great applications are being made, but what's the
point if they are not being recognised?

20. Questions?
@garbit
agarbett@lincoln.ac.uk