Data is a Product

  Why Data Is More Like Water Than Oil Note: This is an update to a blog I wrote years ago as I wanted to reflect more positively on "water as data" and less negatively on "oil as data" to find a better balance in tone for all readers. I hope you enjoy it! For years, the phrase “data is the new oil” has dominated conversations about the digital economy. It’s catchy, and it conveys the idea that data is valuable. But is oil really the best metaphor for data? Perhaps not—especially when we consider the qualities that make data transformative and the cultural contexts in which we operate. Rather than comparing data to oil, a finite resource extracted and consumed, we should think of data as water: life-giving, renewable, and essential for growth. This analogy not only better reflects the nature of data but also resonates deeply with the heritage and values of the Middle East. Why Move Beyond the Oil Analogy? Oil has powered economies and innovation for decades, and it...

 Fair warning to you straight away. This could become a bit of a rant. Also, I'll try to avoid singling out any particular vendors and their marketing campaigns and likewise any economies that are currently extracting fossil fuels. This isn't personal, it's just a point of view on how the data industry has failed to create a clear enough message around the benefits of data and thus failed all of us. When did data become oil? I can't remember exactly when I first heard the term "data is the new oil" but my memory vaguely places it amongst other marketing zingers like "data is a goldmine" (which was ironic to me at the time as I was responsible for an instance of the CRM system called Goldmine, but that's another story). We're talking between 2004 and 2010 here.. So around the time that cloud computing was kicking off and the big SaaS CRM revolution that came with it. Big Data was to emerge towards the back end of that time period. So now we kn...

This blog post was written using the Recorder app on a Google Pixel 3a phone. It transcribes speech so there may be a few small errors but I've corrected what I could see. Enjoy! I wanted to talk about concept for a while now that tries to align big data with what people are really doing in the real world which is often called small data, which is defined as the amount of data that's small enough for human comprehension. Now, obviously lots of organizations have been talking about big data for a long time and there are lots and lots of services to help with that and then this this small data concept has been around for a little while trying to kind of tackle what people can actually manage. But what the problem is that we need something in the middle and lots of organizations can do big data some still do small data, but there are a huge bunch of organizations in the middle that can't do big data. And is big data the right concept for them? It's used to des...

25th May 2018 - it's just over a year until the General Data Protection Regulations come into force. From this point on, organisations who provide products or services to EU citizens will need to abide by the new  rules (regardless of where they are based) or face the rather scary consequences. I'm not going to talk about the Principles or Rights here (attend one of the events run any good data specialist consultancy if you don't know about them yet). What I am going to do here is think about how 'consumers' could react once the rules come into force. Firstly, do people even care about data protection regulations? You can look in any newspaper and read stories of data breaches, lost laptops, hacks and so on to get an idea of the possible level of knowledge. Everyone who is even a little bit savvy about modern business practices will know that sometimes their data could be lost or stolen. However, how many people actually react to these events? Were you one of...

Happy New Year! 2017 is well underway and as things in Politics and Society continue to go in uncertain directions, data is perhaps one area that can be more certain: More data (open, shared & closed) More hacks & security issues More awareness of the law More challenges to fact based decision making Hopefully a focus on schemas & infrastructure Instead of regurgitating my views from an earlier article , check out my thoughts given to Data IQ (note: this was done as part of my day job). I'd also recommend a look at these Open Data predictions from the Guardian . Have a great 2017!

It's finally happened. After the rise and fall of empires, the UK has created a republic of the people. No, we haven't asked the Windsors to move on - what's actually happened is Open Addresses. For anyone who hasn't read this blog before, I'll give you a one paragraph overview of the problem we've faced.. The UK is seen as a leader in Open Data. However, as virtually every decision made by government and businesses involves a 'place', the lack of an open list of places (an address dataset) has been a major problem. We have lots of commercial datasets such as Royal Mail PAF, Ordnance Survey AddressBase and a variety of local gazetteers and other datasets owned by government bodies. While choice is good, in this case the choice and (more importantly) the cost have created issues with uptake of accurate data, problems with matching and in short, chaos. Now, finally, the issues caused by a lack of a free, open and accurate address source for gov...

If you're a follower of my Open Data shenanigans then you may like to know that I'm happily continuing with my work on the Open Data User Group . This year is an important one for the Transparency agenda. We will end with an election but in the mean time, we'll be looking to create the National Information Infrastructure . I won't repeat all of the content that's out there - check out the links provided for the latest. What I will do though is give you a view on what I hope will happen between now and May 2015. NII - A framework for the future The National Information Infrastructure (NII) is intended to be the mechanism, rules, list (and whatever else) that provides us with our national data backbone. Think of it like any other national infrastructure such as roads, rail, phone or water - these are the key services that enable business, government and society to operate. Without them, we're in trouble! Data is just the same - the NII will define whic...

Business Rates - not exactly a sexy topic but as highlighted by this BBC News article , it's something of huge importance to the UK economy and many businesses both old and new trying to grow in a world of online retailers and a slowly recovering economy. As detailed helpfully on the gov.uk site , business rates are basically the non-residential equivalent of Council Tax. Premises are taxed annually to pay for services like rubbish collection, street lights and so on. While some types of property are exempt, the rates affect offices and shops with some types of organisations and areas subject to various forms of discounts . Complicated! Now, with rates calculated by the Valuation Office Agency (in England & Wales at least) based upon the value of the property (similar to the Council Tax banding process with the occasional re-assessment) and a multiplier set by central Government (linked to inflation); there are inevitably going to be some businesses get better value fo...

If you're a regular reader of this blog, you'll probably know that I live in East London and have a passing interest in Open Data(!). After getting to know the guys at Locatable during my visits to the Open Data Institute and Open Government Partnership conference, they asked me to write a guest blog on my personal experience of the property market in East London. The result of this is here and as always reflects my personal opinions (based upon some basic evidence) and in no way reflects upon the views of Locatable or my employer. Anyway, I hope it's interesting! While you're there, take a good look at Locatable as this company represents all that is good about open data and owning your information.

Well 2013 is over and 2014 is upon us. What does it mean? What are the trends going to be this year? I'm not going to join in that game but I am going to spend a little time talking about something that's been on my mind for a while, namely Data Visualisation. This is the term used to describe graphics that communicate facts and figures. These are used by a variety of "data people" from finance departments to marketing managers, journalists and beyond. This article will look at a few of the common tools and good examples to see how data visualisation is being used to change the way data is used to bring value to businesses and people. A wordle of this blog

As the title indicates, it's been far too long since I last wrote a post. Terrible I know. A lot has changed since my last post. I've moved to a new role responsible for B2B Marketing products. My focus is now very much on helping SMEs grow and cut the risks associated with this. This lends itself superbly to the aims of the Open Data movement which is reaching a major milestone this week. On Tuesday 29th October, the Open Data Institute held their first annual summit to celebrate the first 12 months of this superb organisation. Unfortunately, I was unable to attend but followed the event closely on Twitter using the tag #ODIsummit. The major announcement made was the formation of 13 global 'nodes' to help further the cause and bring the collaborative way of working between data owners, start-ups and society to a wider audience. These new nodes include two national trials in the USA & Canada, eight regional/city nodes in Dubai, Chicago, North Carolina, Par...

Hi all, As regular readers will know, I have a hobby: Open Data. As a member of the Open Data User Group I work with a like-minded community to gather requests and produce business cases to encourage public bodies to release more of their data to benefit UK PLC and society. So far, we've had some successes and have also published our first tranche of business cases for datasets such as the VAT Register, river centre lines and historic Met Office observations. These can all be found here and I'd encourage you to comment on them to add your support and further evidence to get this data made available to everyone, for free. Most important of all, we are pushing the UK Government to make available an Open Address Register for the UK. Currently, a number of files exist which are managed and licensed commercially by the likes of the Royal Mail and Ordnance Survey. If you know anything about my day job at Experian QAS, you'll also know that I have an intimate knowledge ...