[Geodata] Geodata Directions

Thu Nov 29 11:09:01 EST 2007

David,

I have added my name to several places on the wiki page you mentioned. I
had been meaning to do this since you sent you first invitation.
Perhaps, like me, others are also interested but just busy. :]

I can see that you have a desire to move things forward, and I believe
you are making an excellent effort as chair of the Public Geospatial
Data Committee. I would like to express my definite interest in two (2)
areas "covered" by the Geodata Committee.

The first is promoting (1) reasonable (2) open and (3) affordable access
to publicly funded geospatial data. I am often times shocked and
insulted at the amount of money or types of extremely restrictive
license conditions that are put on GIS data funded with my public tax
dollars.

The second is geodata licensing. Different licensing options and
education in this area is a critical step in obtaining the goal I
mentioned immediately above. We won't make any heady way in increasing
access to publicly funded GeoSpatial data until agencies have reasonable
licensing and options.

After finding and/or establishing some "open geodata licensing" options,
I think we should consider appointing regional "volunteers" that can
catalog the geodata polocies in place and enforced by public agencies in
their region. (For example, in the United States we might have a couple
of volunteers that work at the Federal or National level, and other
volunteer that serve for each of the 50 states.) After this catalog or
inventory has taken place we can identify agencies we would like to
contact directly about open geodata licensing and hosting options. We
could even promote awareness of geodata licensing issues and reward good
geodata policies by handing out a single "open geodata excellence" award
to one public agency or organization every year.

In the spirit of less talk and more action, I personally volunteer to do
the following:

-          Provide a brief written summary of available geodata licenses
to this mailing list by the end of December 2007.

-          If no suitable "open" geodata licenses exist, work on a draft
license that can be presented to this mailing list be the end of
February 2008.

-          Once existing or draft geodata licenses are "approved" by the
OSGeio, provide (simple) web site design services and web hosting for a
"Geodata Licensing" web site that serves a purpose similar to the
Creative Commons website. The goal will be to have a functioning website
set up by the end of April 2008.

-          Serve as the "regional geodata volunteer" for the State of
California, completing a geodata access policy survey for all California
Counties and major state agencies by the end of December 2008.

Some of this work may already be done, as I am still fairly new to this
list. I also recognize that some of the dates listed above may be
ambitious. But I think they would give us, at a minimum, some targets to
reach for.

In summary, this is an important issue to me, and I am ready to spend
some time and effort on moving it forward, and I am willing to get
started today.

Landon

________________________________

From: geodata-bounces at lists.osgeo.org
[mailto:geodata-bounces at lists.osgeo.org] On Behalf Of David William
Bitner
Sent: Wednesday, November 28, 2007 7:15 AM
To: geodata at lists.osgeo.org
Subject: [Geodata] Geodata Directions

Greetings Geodata folks,

I have to start by saying that I am writing this note out of a bit of
frustration and disappointment.  We currently have 140 members of this
mailing list and 42 people who have self identified on the wiki as
interested in participating in this group.  In the two requests that I
have made recently hoping to get a response from everyone on this list I
have received a total 4 responses.  Only 3 people took the time
(probably less than a couple minutes) to give me scheduling information
to try to find a reasonable monthly meeting time/day of week, and the
only person who has added anything to the wiki (
http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/Public_Geospatial_Data_Project_Update_Mi
ssion) that is up to brainstorm different directions for this group has
been our previous chair. 

This is all a bit disheartening as these are both activities that take
very little time and are supposed to help engage the members of this
group.

I truly believe that for long term success and especially for this group
to be able to engage cooperation and participation with other groups and
individuals, we must be able to clearly state what it is we do and why
we are doing it.  

In order to accomplish this, as a first step, I started the wiki at
http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/Public_Geospatial_Data_Project_Update_Mi
ssion as a starting point for brainstorming.  If any of you have been
involved in strategic planning or creating mission statements,
brainstorming and having a way to voice any and all ideas --  realistic
or grand dreams -- is almost always the starting point.  This list
should be huge when we are done. Once we have a large list, my
intentions are to collate the lists and try to combine duplicate or
highly similar ideas and also tabulate the support that each idea has in
order to distill where the energies of this group lie.  Part of this may
involve another exercise or two for which I will again seek comment and
participation from you.  

I do not see my job as chair of this group to go off and set a direction
for this group and just try to get buy off on that.  I see my job as
trying to facilitate consensus on where our energies and our needs lie. 

I truly hope that we can engage some level of participation from
everyone who is interested in this project.  I do not expect that
everyone will runoff and work on actual data gathering and donate hours
to this project, but I do at least hope that we can leverage this large
community as a sounding board when it comes to determining directions we
should take. 

Please tell me if you think the approach that I am taking is poor.
Please tell me if you have other ideas on how to engage the full
community. Please become engaged yourself!

Thank you all for your interest and your time, 

David
OSGeo, Public Geospatial Data Committee Chair

-- 
************************************
David William Bitner 

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