Open data

28 Sep 2015

Right to Information (RTI) Day is on 28 September 2015. It is part of a global ‘Right to Know’ movement that began in 2002 and promotes the individual’s right of access to information and open and transparent governance.

In 2015 it is more than just about access it now connects with the value of reusing government data in innovative and engaging ways. It is as the Queensland Office of the Information Commissioner says, ‘a day on which citizens and governments from around the world can support and promote open, democratic societies in which there is full citizen empowerment and participation in government.’ ¹

Right to Information is based in legislation which outlines citizen rights and compels government agencies to release information. A complementary and more collaborative approach that is now commonplace in many governments around the world, including Queensland, is open data.

Open data is published by government as raw data that can be downloaded, analysed, shared, mashed-up, re-used and repurposed. It is free and accessible and can be used to encourage people, companies, researchers and non-government organisations to collaborate in developing more efficient and innovative public and/or private digital services and products.

The Queensland Government open data portal went live in October 2012 and now has 1715 data sets and 6596 individual data resources available (and counting) across diverse areas of government from environment to police, education, tourism, finance, transport, arts and culture and much more. One of the most well-known local applications that use government data is the MyTranslink app. TransLink share timing and scheduling data as open data with developers to create real time travel information via a mobile app interface.

So what does it mean for the arts?
There are currently 93 datasets that are returned when you search arts and culture. Arts Queensland’s data including funding approvals and expenditure data across a variety of current and historic Arts Queensland grant programs. Data sets include funding approved and expended across a range of programs, lists of arts industry experts and peers, awards, funding to local government and arts consultation data.

It is an ongoing project to continue to release raw data resources as well as data analysis. For instance, Arts Queensland’s Outcomes data for organisations – arts and cultural investment lists employment outcomes, volunteer and salaries expenditure, attendance and participation and income and expenditure of small to medium organisations funded by Arts Queensland since 2005. The dataset has come in very handy during the recent Senate Inquiry with the data viewed 89 times.

Another data resource, Arts grants expenditure from 2011-12 to 2014-15 has had 179 views and provides a comprehensive snapshot of State government arts and cultural expenditure in Queensland for the last four years. Over this period Arts Queensland has:

• disbursed $539,679,486 (the majority of this is administered grants to arts statutory bodies at $386,242,000)
• processed 2,325 grants payments (averaging 522 grant payments per year)
• had an average grant payment of $232,194
• the median grant payment was $18,602
• the mode (most frequent grant amount) was $1,000 and
• the maximum grant payment in a given year was $55,023,000 (State Library of Queensland) and
• the minimum grant payment was $119 (final payment of larger grant)

Other state government cultural organisations have also been active in this space. State Library of Queensland have recently used the Property Location Service open data provided by the Department of Natural Resources and Mines to populate and validate Queensland addresses entered in their online membership registration form, saving new members time as their address is automatically entered into the online form minimising errors in data entry. SLQ also contributed data to GovHack 2015 (the annual open data competition) and was at the special World War 1 hack event at the State Library of New South Wales over the weekend 3 – 5 July. SLQ met with passionate digital creatives, data analysts, story tellers, entrepreneurs and civic society enthusiasts who wanted to mash-up and create with SLQ’s World War 1 data.

Queensland Museum’s data is routinely used by researchers and developers, for instance in the Atlas of Living Australia app and they have published many data resources on the government’s open data portal. Their aim is ‘to develop, document, implement, maintain and review datasets for release to the public in the hope that they can be used by the community in the co-creation of new services and improvement of existing services.’ ²

QAGOMA have released metadata relating to the artworks and artists in their Collection, attendance figures since the opening of Queensland Art Gallery building in 1982, and major exhibition attendance since the opening of the Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA) in 2006. The API (application programming interface) for screenings at the Australian Cinémathèque and upcoming public programs are also published. ³

There is a lot more we could do and we’re keen to work with developers and entrepreneurs to use data to develop products and services in the arts and cultural sector  just contact us at aqpolicy@arts.qld.gov.au We’re also inspired by the fantastic work being undertaken the UK with http://culturehack.org.uk and http://openglam.org/

Notes:
1. Office of the Information Commissioner, The history of international Right to Know Day.
2. See http://www.qm.qld.gov.au/Footer/Right+to+Information/Open+data#.VgIiz9WqpBc
3. See QAGOMA blog post http://blog.qagoma.qld.gov.au/open-darta/