Open Data Licensing:Trojan horse or sunken treasure?

UCD Library Leabharlann UCD

Eoin McCarney & Caleb Derven

UCD Library

http://www.flickr.com/photos/gogap/253649673/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/nathanf/2315489782/

Overview

• What is open data?

• The Open Data Commons Public Domain Dedication & Licence

• What does it cover?

• Who is using the licence?

• What does it mean for library systems?

• Varieties of openness

• Systems context & issues

• Opening other kinds of library data

• Is it worth it?

What is Open Data?

• “A philosophy and practice requiring that certain data are freely available to everyone, without restrictions from copyright, or other mechanisms of control”. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_data

• "A piece of knowledge is open if you are free to use, reuse, and redistribute it“.

http://opendefinition.org/

The Licence

• Open Data Commons – Public Domain Dedication & Licence

• Created October 2007 by Jordan Hatcher & Dr. Charlotte Waelde

• Based on Talis Community License; funded by Talis

• Similar to GNU general public license for open source software

• Open Data Commons & Open Knowledge Foundation Project

The License

“The Open Data Commons Public Domain Dedication & Licence is a document intended to allow you to freely share, modify, and use this work for any purpose and without any restrictions.

This licence is intended for use on databases or their contents (”data”), either together or individually”

http://www.opendatacommons.org/licenses/pddl/1.0/

What does it cover?

• Copyright & database rights

- Dedicate rights to the public domain

or

- Waive rights

or

- License rights

What does it mean for library systems?

• Library as a producer

• Library as a consumer

•  "It won’t allow you to require anyone to do anything if they use your data, like attribute it or re-distribute it freely. But it will mean that your data is forever free, and anybody who wants to who gets your data can do whatever they like with it, including redistribute it. And that is what is needed." 

    (http://bibwild.wordpress.com/2008/11/24/creative- commons-is-not-appropriate-for-data/)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/photosan0/2682021566/

Varieties of Openness

• Open source software • Open standards

• Open access

• Open data

The Systems Context for Open Data

• Libraries expose and ingest data through  

o Z39.50 

o Search Retrieval via URL (SRU) 

o OAI-PMH

Open Data and Systems - The High Level Issues

• Longevity – data vs. platform

• Software as a service  - how do you retrieve your data?

  • Community-maintained data sets and standards

 

Open Data and Systems - On-the-ground Issues

• Flexible infrastructures • Flexible protocols

 • Flexible communication standards

Opening Other Kinds of Library Data

• Anonymised circulation data (Huddersfield) • Library Stock Usage Data (JISC TILE Project)

• Library Of Congress – Authority & Subject Files available via web services.

Open Data - Is it Worth It?

Risks:

• No going back with ODC PDDL

• Systems need to be leveraged

• Greater need for QA

• Information specialist vs. interested amateur

Benefits:

• Makes data available to all

• Formalises collaborative ethos of libraries

• Value for money