Data is a Product

This week, I attended the first meeting of the Cabinet Office's new Open Data User Group . This is a new body that has been set up to help advise the Government on which datasets to provide in an open form to the general public. In essence, it will look at which ones can achieve the greatest economic and social value for the most appropriate cost to the body that produces it (mainly the four trading funds that make up the Public Data Group ). I was very lucky to be chosen (from over 75 applicants) to represent big business and bring my take on product management, building the business case and of course the compliance and security issues around data to the table. I join some truly influential people on this Group and I'm delighted to be playing my part. I'll obviously keep using my blog to share my own personal thoughts on data and product management so it's again worth a quick mention that my views do not represent those of my employer or the ODUG. Anyway, I...

Since starting this Blog I've been ribbed constantly by some friends that the title should be 'Data Are a Product' rather than Data is a Product. It goes back to the question on whether Datum is the singular and Data is the plural for what most people generally just call data. It was therefore nice to see this Wall Street Journal blog that tried to answer the question once and for all. Happilly for me, it seems to say 'who cares?' and just decides to use data for both singluar and plural. Now I'm a bit of a stickler for grammar (apart from this one example) so I'm obviously relieved that I won't be losing any more sleep over this conundrum.

Some of you may know me quite well and know a little about the company I work for. Yes, we deal with a lot of data and offer a lot of services around the intelligent use of data across an organisation. One of these is helping companies create what is generically known as a Single Customer View (or Single Citizen View in the Public Sector). I wanted to spend a little time looking at what a Single Customer View (SCV) is and what it could be in the future as the effects of Big Data enable us to do more.

Following on from my excited picture post last week, I've now digested the Government White Paper on Open Data: Unleashing the Potential. My thoughts are below and I'm sure they will be similar to the thoughts of many other people around the industry. For a nice run down, check out this article at the Guardian. In short, the White Paper gives an update on progress made so far and the plans for the future. One of the most significant things here is the apparent passion for the movement shown by Francis Maude MP. In fact, during his launch he spoke many times of his team of 'Guerrillas' and 'Zealots' who are running round Whitehall, encouraging their colleagues (apparently in many different ways) to get behind Transparency and take the risk. A few key points for you: Over 9,000 datasets have been made available on www.data.gov.uk . The site has been redesigned to make it easier to search for data and use it. Every department has now published it's Ope...