Public Geospatial Data Project

This project was recently approved as official foundation committee.

Mission

Promote the use of open geospatial formats

Providing best-practise guidelines and examples for use of open and free standards for data (GML, WMS, WFS-T) and metadata (Dublin Core, RDF).

Promote public access to state-collected geodata

Lead by example in demonstrating economic value and research activity generated by open access to public geographic information.

Run a repository of open geodata

A collection of geospatial datasets shall be hosted by the PGDP. Additionally, links to other open data repostories shall be collected.

Present and explain licenses for public geodata

The PGDP aims to collect licenses suitable for the publishing of public geodata. The license shall be presented along with a summary of its benefits and focus.

Approach

The Public Geospatial Data Project of the Open Source Geospatial Foundation is currently in the "definition phase". That means that we're in the process of putting together information about the kinds of things we could do, which organizations might be relevant, how the project might be structured, etc. Since the entire OSGeo is new, we're really working out the process for starting a non-software based project as we go.

Likely scenario

• Information gathering
• Develop list of potential participants
• Invite people/organizations to express interest
• Discuss potential charter (is there an "official" OSGeo name for this?)
• Present charter to OSGeo Board for approval (or do the members also get to vote on it?)
  • Charter should probably have "Terms of Reference" - i.e. what the group will do
  • Charter should probably have an initial list of participants/organizations (not all need to be members)
  • Charter should name a Chair and a Vice Chair (or co-chairs?) (must proposed chair already be a member or can s/he become a member by virtue of being part of this?)
• Assuming project is approved - Get to work!

Potential Members

If you add people/orgs to this list, please indicate whether you're adding yourself/your organization or whether you are "nominating" the person/organization as a potential member.

Individuals

Please add yourself

• David Bitner (self)
• Allan Doyle (self)
• Florian Kindl (nominated)
• Pericles S. Nacionales (self)
• Markus Neteler (self)
• Jo Walsh (nominated)
• Helton Uchoa (self) - User:Uchoa
• Aaron Racicot (self) - Ecotrust - aaronr at ecotrust.org
• Daniel Brookshier (self)
• Schuyler Erle (self)
• Jeff McKenna (DM Solutions)
• Steve Coast (nominated)
• Mikel Maron (self)
• Alessandro Frigeri (self)

Organizations

• EOGEO (self)
• OpenStreetMap Project (potential)
• GSDI Association (potential)

Events

Events where we can either promote our positions or are likely to run into like-minded individuals.

• Asian Conference on the Digital Commons - April 18-20, 2006, Bangkok, Thailand
• Where 2.0 - June 13-14, 2006, San Jose, California, USA
• FOSS4G2006 - Free And Open Source Software for Geoinformatics - September 12-15, 2006, Lausanne, Switzerland

Existing Work

Geo Data Licenses

• Public Geodata License
• Group PGL-Canada
• Creative Commons

Geo Data Repositories / Group Collection Projects

• OpenStreetMap Project
• Free Earth Foundation
• Canadian Base Data
• Various Free Datasets via Bittorrent
• Global Map - International Steering Committee for Global Mapping
• Geonames.org - Geonames is integrating geographical data such as names, altitude, population and others from various sources
• Geospatial One Stop
• Global Change Master Directory

Geo Data Repository & Policy Research

• University of Maine Commons for Geographic Data
• MetroGIS Twin Cities, MN Metro Area Public Agency Data Sharing Effort
• MN Governor's Council on Geographic Information

Geo Data Policy Advocacy

• Public Geodata Project (IRC: publicgeodata) with the support of the Open Knowledge Foundation
• Open Access to State-Collected Geospatial Data Manifesto

Open Access

There are also more general open access movements, often aimed at scientific data, that could provide a venue for broadening awareness of the geo-specific issues.

• Berlin 4 Open Access - From Promise to Practice - March 29-31, 2006 Golm, Germany
• Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities
• The Locus Forum - "The Locus Association is a trade association of private organisations working to increase opportunities and reduce barriers to fair trade between the public and private sector, particularly in the use of Public Sector Information."

Further Reading

• Give us back our crown jewels - 2006-03-09 article in the Guardian
• Why Europe Needs to Provide its Own Public Geodata by Jo Walsh (Feb 15, 2006)
• ShareAlike considered harmful for geodata by Richard Fairhurst, a critique of GPL-like licensing situations with suggested LGPL-like model for distribution.
• "Open Source Software for Spatial Data Infrastructure (FOSSDI)". SDIC submitted 2005 to INSPIRE/EU.
  PDF with layout | HTML without layout
• Open Networks and Open Society: The Relationship between Freedom, Law, and Technology - MIT World video featuring Hal Abelson, John Wilbanks, Creative Commons