Where Are The APIs For Government Data?
from the open-'em-up dept
It shouldn't be a huge surprise that the government isn't always the fastest to embrace what the internet lets it do (even if it did basically fund the creation of the internet). However, a new report out of Princeton's Center for Information Technology Policy is suggesting that it's about time that the government make its data more widely accessible for a web 2.0 world. Basically, the government has put up websites, but it hasn't done much to make it so that it's easy to access the data available in those websites or (even more important) let other applications and services do something with that data and actually make it useful to the citizens that data is supposed to help. Given the pace of government activity in this arena, maybe we can expect some sort of movement in this direction by about 2016 or so. But wouldn't it be nice if we could actually easily pull government data and make it useful?![Hide This Hide this](https://ii.techdirt.com/s/t/i/topclose.png)
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Filed Under: api, data, government, government data
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API?
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hahahhahha
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Re:
Because we, the taxpayers, fund the research and data collection I strongly believe that we, the taxpayers, should get access to the data we funded. Particularly if the data's already supposed to be publicly available anyway; we're not asking for access to sensitive data, just a way to access the data, and manipulate it to a useful format.
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Re: Re:
That is not to say they can as well considering so many agencies are using more legacy systems then you are aware which in turn limits there ability to provide API's or adapt their websites for Web 2.0 . I work for a court that still uses Exchange server 2000 and Enterprise Server 2002.
I personally attribute this to the fact the governments have racial profiling in the opposite sense that they hire asians because they are suppose to be really good at computer. Our IT employs 1 caucasian, 1 african american and the rest are asians with "general" computer science. they have no motivation to continuously learn with evolving technologies and quite a few don't own computers at home. So how is the government suppose to update its infrastructure (which needs to happen first before opening APIs)If it is satisfied with "plug-n-play" IT guys?
Those are just two factors from my perspective but the main point is security. Internally very few understand appropriate levels of security for their infrastructure.
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Death and Taxes?
I'd love to say "let's get those API's made, but we all know those pork-barreling jerkwads would want $5 million in blood-sucked tax money in order to accomplish $10,000 worth of web development.
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mySociety.org
Is there an equivalent in the US?
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Re: mySociety.org
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APIs Do Exist
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none
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