UK Gov't Throws Open Data For Mashups; Offers Prize Money For Best Results

from the about-time dept

We were just complaining about the fact that governments should be exposing APIs on certain government data so that people can create more useful services out of them -- and it appears that someone in the UK was having similar thoughts. The government is now opening up a bunch of data to whoever wants to play with it. Not only is the gov't encouraging people to make mash-ups with the data, it's actually offering cash prizes to those who come up with the best results. Nice to see a government doing something smart.

4 Comments | Leave a Comment..


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  1.  

    Not their idea

    identicon
    Ben, Jul 3rd, 2008 @ 2:13am

    It might be a smart thing to do but it is not the goverments bright idea to do this. The guradian has been running a free our data campaign for years proposing that they do something like this.

    reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  2.  

    I guess

    identicon
    mike allen, Jul 3rd, 2008 @ 4:18am

    sugestions like put in laptop then leave on train would not win.

    reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  3.  

    Not actually smart

    identicon
    Martin, Jul 3rd, 2008 @ 5:08am

    This isn't a smart idea. It just shows that the government collects more data than they really need, even more than they can handle themselves. This is sad.

    reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  4.  

    Apps for Democracy is doing this in the US

    identicon
    Peter Corbett, Oct 24th, 2008 @ 4:47pm

    We're doing this in the US and believe it's very important to the health of our democracy, innovation and saving tax payer dollars! CHeck out http://www.appsfordemocracy.org. We've got $20,000 in prize to give out by 11/12. Peter http://www.istrategylabs.com

    reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]


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