When you’re launching a data service, key questions:

• Is Google or other big guys already building apps that consume this data? If so, how do they want it?
• Are there other cities that provide similar apps? What data formats do they use?
• Dan O’Neill: data still balkanized. e.g. NY building permits in excel more frequently updated than the xml feed from bigapps
• ACTION: Everyblock to work on standards doc: Class A data feed looks like this: frequency, semantics, normalities; if you can’t do that, class B looks like this

Standards

• The importance of conventions. The web worked because www.foo.com was guessable. So let’s promote conventions like: apps.dc.gov, data.ny.gov. http://www.datasf.org/ isn’t guessable.
• Listing of data standards:
  • See http://wiki.civiccommons.org for a good list of the state of the art in standards, case studies etc.
  • GTFS - General Transit Feed Spec http://code.google.com/transit/spec/transit_feed_specification.html
  • (FusedLogic had some problems with this spec.) There’s an active mailing list, room for extensibility.
  • OGDI - http://ogdi.sourceforge.net/
  • geoweb DNS http://wiki.open311.org/GeoWeb_DNS
  • OAuth/OpenID Best practices
  • Question of Read/Write APIs?
  • Missing persons and People Finder Interchange Format http://zesty.ca/pfif/

Identify Data Structures

• Standardized content
• Metadata - in human readable format
• Need contact info associated with the feed

• Data Types
  • Crime
  • Transit
  • Restaurant inspections
  • Building permits
  • Street (potholes, street obstructions) - private company obstructions not covered by 311 requests - 311 associated only with labor on the city side
  • Legislative testimony, transcripts
  • Parking
  • Tax assessments
  • Demographic data
  • Statistical transit data
  • Basemap/geocoding WGS84, KML
  • Parks - what sports fields
  • Calendars - event schedules - need better calendaring systems. “Outside.in has its act together here”
  • Business Licenses
  • Employee directory/org charts

• Missing: Feedback loops: was 311 fixed to your satisfaction?
• Craigslist a good source for many fundamental datasets (eg waste that isn’t really waste); Freecycle

Leverage existing Tools

• Meetup
• Twitter - Best practices
• Twitter API should be cloned by 311
• Facebook
• LinkedIn
• Wordpress, Tumblr on-demand info
• Gowalla
• Yelp - now doing check-ins - idea to get women/minority owned data in there
• Foursquare
• OpenTable?
• Craigslist
• Localdirt, Farmsreach, JustFood in NY to bring fresh food into urban food deserts
• Walkscore - get more data sets in there
• What are the best practices and tools for API management? mashery? sonoa?
• Tools for metrics, measuring engagement
• FrontlineSMS http://www.frontlinesms.com/, also tools like http://www.textmarks.com/ for group SMS, freejam, forinfo
• Google Voice - what are good examples of voice integration?
• Dashboards - GoodData (cloud analytics), Intuit Quickbase
• Amazon Web Services
• VMWare
• UserVoice

What would make city IT more efficient? How do we think about improving city workflow?

• versioning of datasets
• interface to systems like Hastis from the new stuff
• Ward Cunningham’s Visible Workings

What does the well-formed future look like? What’s the greater vision?

Outcomes

• Listing of data standards
  • Recommended
  • Style/Principles
  • Frequency/semantics/normalities
  • Manage need/want
  • Include narrative
• Tools that are compliant
• Tools that munis can use for specific tools
• Push Craig to better engage muni services
• If you adopt X, you’ll get Y stories: city, IT dept, developer, end-user
  • like the way citygoround shows value of GTFS