This is a new thread for Open Data, with @Brittney and @David_Jones at least.
One question I have is what motivates companies to release their data in the open, and how to facilitate that move.
I recently spoke with one of the managers of a municipal open data repository who told me that their success has been directly related to the fact that, rather than arguing for pure openness or transparency, they have pitched it as a chance to glean economic benefit by opening data. That said, these are government bodies and even amongst them, there is a feeling that datasets which are expensive to produce (e.g. dynamic bus times, geological survey information, etc.) should not necessarily be so completely devalued by offering them up for free. In fact, the idea that things could be “open” or in the rhetoric of the conversation “shared” without being “free” might be a very important notion for for-profit companies…
My current experience is in terms of public sector and the UK government Open Data and Transparency agenda. So there is the mix of legislation and incentives to be more committed, for example additional funding and programmes to publish more.
That is within the sphere of the EU article you put up, namely public funds and accountability but I am less certain in terms of the private sector unless it is a big flagship like Google etc.
Article (now found) about the “jump” in the new business model to possess a resource of Big Data and to put it out there. The Other ‘Sharing’ Economy That’s About To Change (Forbes), but not that I buy into this ideal view re issues about owning your own data.
So unless the company already has that data, or is helped to release it (something like car management systems…?), I can only really see other companies being dependent and using that data for their own growth. Not necessarily adding anything new.
In UK there are government comments about the value of the untapped national and local government data to the economy. For example for small start ups to develop an app (for sale) based on this “open data”, but as you say there is the potential devalue and the cost to the originator to provide it in the first place. Or the government body cannot engage in similar commercial activities because it’s role is to offer it up for others 
Hi Paul
I think that sadly most companies do not do it for altruistic reasons however much we would love to believe that they do it always comes down to the bottom line or potential financial benefit they can derive from it in one way or another. Today I downloaded a piece of “free” software that produces audio from text files and yes it was free but every two pages a pop up appeared asking whether you wanted to upgrade to the paid version. Off course it also stopped the process and you had to restart it every time, so obviously at that point most people hit the upgrade button and pay the required fee. So sadly I think that “free” is the new bandwagon a lot of companies get on and they do it basically to hook the prospective client.
By law it is also basically a requirement for any person in a fiduciary role to act in such a way that a companies revenue is maximized. (I know it to be so in the USA and SA, not sure about company law in other parts of the world).
On the other hand off course being a South African I am immensely proud of Mark Shuttleworth who put his money where his mouth is and who actively pursues open source. I still remember getting my first copy of Ubuntu with a large green logo GO OPEN SOURCE, so maybe my pessimism is not necessarily correct and I sincerely hope that there are more like him out there.
Right, no one should expect altruistic reasons, but there might be some ways going open would (financially) benefit those companies. It’s interesting that more and more companies are adopting this for software, but not for data.
And yes, Shuttleworth’s foundation is great and a good place to put (a tiny fraction of) his money!
We are supposed to reflect this week on an open practice (relating to open data for this group).
I have been involved in a collaboration called LMFDB, to openly share mathematical data on the web between mathematicians. You can see it in action at lmfdb.org. It’s specialized, so except for getting pretty pictures (after digging a bit), it would be of no use to you, really.
Thanks for sharing and as you say specialised… But it is there and that is one of the points.
I have been trying to find some of the private company examples that are suggested by the “billions of dollars untapped revenue” articles. As compared to the public sector domain (a lot more about transparency), education or research (big data and pooling of resources) and digital web v2.0
Not so obvious unless you are also wanting to practice your new data wrangle / JSON skills / visualisation skills.
For example, I have used Duedil for looking up companies for job interviews, and in the recent Joel Gurin book some categorisation for the early adopters. Suppliers, aggregators and then developers, enrichers and enablers.
I still see more with transparency and vigilance, if NOT looking at the education open pedagogy.
(Sorry for not adding to the discussion so far as distracted by real world things and trying to get back into is).