Abstract
Open government data are fast becoming entrenched in our society. However, even though open government data may be “free”, it is not “gratis”. It takes substantial human and financial resources not only to collect and maintain government data, but also to process the data to be suitable for distribution as open data. Those resources need to be funded. In this chapter, we identify potential funding models for open data. We also explore the costs of implementing open data policies, and the benefits of open data, both for the open data organisation and for society. We demonstrate that the once-off operational costs of open data supply are marginal compared to the total operational costs of the open data organisation. Open data leads to efficiency gains within the open data organisation and to societal benefits. However, to reap those benefits, it is essential that organisations switching to open data, receive compensation, at least in the short-term. The compensation may be found in a new paid role in the information value chain.
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Notes
- 1.
Group of 8 2013.
- 2.
Welle Donker 2016.
- 3.
Rhind 2014.
- 4.
In literature preceding the term ‘open data’ this regime is referred to as ‘open access model’, see e.g. Onsrud 1992b. Since the Budapest Open Access Initiative in February 2002 (http://www.budapestopenaccessinitiative.org/), the term ‘open access’ is more often used to denote the provision of free online access to scientific publications and/or research outputs (cf. European Commission 2015).
- 5.
See e.g. Onsrud 1992b.
- 6.
- 7.
Cf. Lateral Economics 2016.
- 8.
See e.g. Carrara et al. 2015.
- 9.
See e.g. Van Loenen 2009.
- 10.
Onsrud 1992a.
- 11.
Van Loenen 2009.
- 12.
Deloitte LLP 2012.
- 13.
http://www.infoempresa.com. Accessed May 2018.
- 14.
http://www.openopps.com. Accessed May 2018.
- 15.
Schiff 2003.
- 16.
http://www.connemaraprogramme.com/. Accessed May 2018.
- 17.
http://www.graphdefined.de. Accessed May 2018.
- 18.
Welle Donker and Van Loenen 2016a.
- 19.
http://www.cropdiagnosis.com. Accessed May 2018.
- 20.
http://www.esri.com/software/open/open-data. Accessed May 2018.
- 21.
- 22.
Welle Donker et al. 2017a, p. 23.
- 23.
Welle Donker and Van Loenen 2016b.
- 24.
- 25.
- 26.
Omidyar Network 2014, p. 8.
- 27.
Omidyar Network 2014, p. 8.
- 28.
See e.g. Gerechtshof Den Haag 2014.
- 29.
Other sensitive data may be data which may pose a threat to the national security or public safety, data containing business and/or manufacturing data that was provided to the government organization in confidence, or data that may be environmentally sensitive data, e.g. related to breeding sites of rare species (cf. Aarhus Convention 1998, pp. 6–7).
- 30.
See further Chap. 7 of this volume.
- 31.
As proposed by the Dutch National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) in their concept of an ‘automated open data washing’ process, see Van Loenen et al. 2016.
- 32.
Van Loenen et al. 2016.
- 33.
See further Chap. 9 of this volume.
- 34.
http://business.data.gov.uk/companies/. Accessed May 2018.
- 35.
De Vries 2014.
- 36.
Welle Donker et al. 2017b.
- 37.
Air gapping is a security measure, in which a given system is totally isolated—electronically and physically—from other networks, especially those that are not secure.
- 38.
- 39.
De Vries 2014.
- 40.
Lind 2014.
- 41.
DECA 2010.
- 42.
Lind 2014.
- 43.
Johnson et al. 2017.
- 44.
World Wide Web Foundation 2017.
- 45.
PwC and Uscreates 2015.
- 46.
See e.g. the Open Data Barometer reports, 2nd to 4th editions.
- 47.
Sasse et al. 2017.
- 48.
Algemene Rekenkamer 2014, p. 13. Most often, this percentage is 0.0 as most organisations do not allocate extra FTEs to open data activities.
- 49.
- 50.
Ordnance Survey 2017, p. 48.
- 51.
Ordnance Survey 2017, p. 25.
- 52.
Welle Donker et al. 2017b.
- 53.
Lateral Economics 2016.
- 54.
Welle Donker et al. 2017b.
- 55.
Welle Donker and Van Loenen 2016b.
- 56.
DECA 2010.
- 57.
Bregt et al. 2013.
- 58.
Bregt et al. 2014.
- 59.
Grus et al. 2015.
- 60.
Bregt et al. 2016.
- 61.
This includes £5M per annum in cost savings for passengers who previously subscribed to SMS alerts and the value of new real-time alert services.
- 62.
Deloitte LLP 2017.
- 63.
De Vries et al. 2011, p. 9.
- 64.
Deloitte LLP 2017.
- 65.
Michael Fallon, UK Minister for Business and Enterprise, cited by PASC 2014.
- 66.
- 67.
Deloitte LLP 2017.
- 68.
Kronenburg et al. 2012.
- 69.
Kronenburg et al. 2012.
- 70.
Lind 2014.
- 71.
Davies 2013.
- 72.
See e.g. Eaves 2010.
- 73.
- 74.
This was the case for the Netherlands Vehicle Authority, where data with more attributes and 24/7 access are available as a fee-based service. The Dutch National Data Warehouse for Traffic Information supplies data with more attributes under reciprocal ‘data-for-service’ agreements.
- 75.
See e.g. Welle Donker and van Loenen 2016b
- 76.
Johnson et al. 2017.
- 77.
World Wide Web Foundation 2017.
- 78.
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Welle Donker, F. (2018). Funding Open Data. In: van Loenen, B., Vancauwenberghe, G., Crompvoets, J. (eds) Open Data Exposed. Information Technology and Law Series, vol 30. T.M.C. Asser Press, The Hague. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-6265-261-3_4
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