A major new website has been launched by the Government to give unprecedented access to free data all in one place. The site was open to 2400 developers prior to the official launch on the 21 January so they could make a start on developing products using the data.
It contains more than 2500 sets of data from across many departments, is non personal and in a format that can be re-used by individuals or companies. For example, there is a video showing the traffic congestion on the UK motorways in the last ten years.
Traffic distribution according to vehicle type
More images are available on the developers’ flickr site.
The Newspaper Club have developed a ‘postcode newspaper’ which details the public services available within a particular postcode.
Tim Berners Lee comments “Government data should be a public resource. By releasing it, we can unlock new ideas for delivering public services, help communities and society work better, and let talented entrepreneurs and engineers create new businesses and services. ”
There are some interseting comments and some insite into how they’ve eventually managed to do this in the Prospect Magazine from the University of London Whitehall’s Web Revolution, the Inside Story.
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