Typically,
I find the majority of Wiley's resources useful and relevant, but at
first pass, the first video in the Open Data section of the course was
neither, for me. As a learner, I'm trying to understand conceptual
relationships between all things "open," as described in each section.
The TEDx video of Tim Berners-Lee
fast-talking about "linked data" and leading the audience in a chant of
"Raw Data Now!" really had me feeling less informed about open data,
after watching it (The Next Web of Open, Linked Data, TEDx March 13,
2009).
Part of the problem was that I couldn't keep up with him -
he's clearly a technical wizard - and his wildly excitable gestures and
his intermittent use of tech-savvy terms were distracting at best. After
watching this video I wasn't convinced a) that I had a clear
understanding of "open data" or 2) that it would matter to me at all
even if I did understand it.
So I move ahead, reading through the
other resources. And lo and behold, what do I find? I find this, from
the Wikipedia entry Wiley links to: :"The concept of open data is
not new; but although the term is currently in frequent use, there are
no commonly agreed definitions..." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_data).
Oh, goodie! Another completely unformed concept to learn about. I can't
say that hasn't been a trend in this particular course of study, so I'm
not surprised.
A little puzzled, I went back to the video with
Berner-Lee. He said something early in the talk about the differences
between data and documents, and that's been helpful - data is something
you typically can't use by itself, in isolation. It has relationships
to other things, other data. I wanted to revisit that, to see if I could
get something more from that. I did.
According to Berner-Lee,
documents on the web are usually stand-alone items that you can (if they
are open) use, repurpose, share, all of which can inform you and
others. Data has to be related to something else - or put in context,
if you will - to be useable, relevant. So I start to think about data
the way Berners-Lee recommends: as relationships. He mentions social
networking. So I friend someone on Facebook, for example. Okay, well,
that's data, he says. That's data about me, about my friend, about the
networks I'm in, about the things I'm interested in, and so on. So the connection
itself is data, but it's not meaningful unless taken all together, as
in, looking at what/who I'm connecting to and why that gives the world
of Facebook some information about me. And that information, when
'linked' with other users' information, is powerful and can provide a
comprehensive portrait of who I am online. Interesting! That is an
explanation I can relate to.
So the sum is greater than the value
of each part. Got it. But with that metaphor we're wandering dangerously
close to another subject I find uninteresting, at best, which is math.
So
back to relationships. I like data better when I think about it as
relationships. So the "linking data" Berner-Lee is talking about is
basically like taking little bits of information produced by and about
people, and then connecting it to another person's little bit about
them, and so on, and so on, until there is a huge network of
relationships/data available to, by and for everyone. Neat. Don't get
too overwhelmed, now, but that 'network' of relationships, ie data,
looks something like this:
- Linking Open Data cloud diagram, by Richard Cyganiak and Anja Jentzsch. http://lod-cloud.net
There
are other resources from Wiley that paint a descriptive picture of what
open data might be, and how it might be relevant or useful. The United
States government is working with open data and providing it to anyone
in the world, via their website, data.gov.
This is a cool project, I think, because aside from data that could
compromise or influence issues of national security, the government puts
information about projects, initiatives, and all sorts of other things
being paid for by tax dollars, out on the web for anyone to see and use
and reuse. That kind of transparency is arguably one ingredient of a
successful democratic process. That is a pretty big implication about
open data and the value it can provide. And from what I can tell, it's
one of many more yet to be discovered.
