The Zero-Now Case OPSI SO 42-8-6
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Christopher Corbin
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Tuesday 05 June 2007 12:58:11 pm
The Zero-Now Case OPSI SO 42-8-6
The publication by the UK Office of Public Sector Information (OPSI) of a report on its investigation of a complaint (SO 42-8-6) raises some interesting issues.
http://www.epsiplus.net/epsiplus/...ector_information_so_42_8_6_may_2007
The PSI Regulations 2005 within the UK have been in force since the 1st July 2005 yet the report is reporting on a PSIH in this case Milton Keynes Council (A unitary authority) that has not complied with the PSI Regulations yet OPSI under paragraph 26 only makes suggestions for compliance!
A survey undertaken by PSI Consulting based in Cardiff showed that Local Government has yet to implement fully the PSI Regulations 2005 as such Milton Keynes Council may not be alone with respect to not implementing the PSI Regulations 2005.
http://www.epsiplus.net/epsiplus/...426_psih_s_surveyed_re_psi_directive
Case SO 42-8-6 is also interesting in that it brings out an example of upstream and down stream private sector bodies in relation to the PSIH itself.
The Complainant Zero-Now Limited is down stream and provides a web service and has made requests (although the report states the Council have no record of receiving such a request!) for the re-use of PSI.
http://www.miltonkeynes.com/
The report states that the PSIH has an upstream contractor MK Web in which the PSIH holds a 20% stake. The report goes on to state that the contract was awarded under open competition to supply a web management and hosting service on the PSIH’s behalf.
http://www.milton-keynes.gov.uk/
MK Web also operates an online information service down stream of the PSI at http://www.mkweb.co.uk/
However if one visit's both these down stream web sites it is difficult to establish the difference that has lead OPSI to reach the conclusions it has included in paragraph 24. In many respects the web sites are similar to a conventional newspaper that publishes public sector information sometimes verbatim and sometimes via editorial, which constitutes re-use under the PSI Directive.
Within the value chain and related to one of the companies mentioned above is indeed a newspaper chain - in this example MK News which is owned by Lsn Media Limited.
http://www.mk-news.co.uk/mknews%2Daboutus/DisplayArticle.asp?ID=38376
A further interesting aspect of the case is that of the copyright statements that appear on the above mentioned web sites. The OPSI reports on this at paragraph 27 that there has been an improvement as a result of OPSI involvement.
One senses that this particular case is far from closed and one should not be surprised if the issues are not raised under the PSI Regulations under the appeal process or as a competition complaint, which as it happens is where it started in the first place.
The case is far from clear and raises a number of questions.
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Question 1: Does the OPSI have the powers to enforce local government bodies to comply with the PSI Regulations?
Question 2: Is an information portal that in many respects is similar to a newspaper constitute re-use of PSI?
Question 3: Is an information portal that is bringing together a range of information some of which originates from the public sector providing value?
Question 4: In the complex value chain involving upstream and down stream presence in relation to the PSIH of one private company is there adequate separation between the entities or is there leakage across of the PSIH information across the various commercial interests of the group of private companies involved? On the face of it this appears to be the reason why the complainant Zero-Now went to the OFT and subsequently to the OPSI – but has the OPSI addressed this particular issue?
Question 5: What is the private and public sector ownership in the private companies involved in the case?
Question 6: Why does the Milton Keynes Council web site provide links on the left hand side of the home page to its own partially owned information portal and not to others?
Question 7: Are the links referred to in Question 6 above part of the public task? If no this is added value then why has the OPSI reached the conclusion they have?
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Christopher Corbin
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Sunday 05 August 2007 9:47:22 am
Separation of up-stream and downstream
Is there a separation between the contracted (with a private company MKWeb) upstream activity of providing a web service to Milton Keynes Council and the private sector down stream activity offered by MKWeb?
In order to try and answer the question posed one could visit the two web sites concerned to check what is on the Milton Keynes Council web site (public task) and that of the commercial web site operated by MKWeb (carries advertisements).
One then finds that the commercial web site displays Ordnance Survey of Great Britain topographic map data that states:
“© Crown Copyright. All rights reserved Milton Keynes Council Licence No. LA078638”
(Visit URL: http://www.mkweb.co.uk/visitorinfo/home.asp and then go to the section on the left hand side of the page headed Maps of Milton Keynes and then select MK Maps– you may need to zoom in as map data from different suppliers is displayed at different scales).
This perhaps indicates that there is no separation between the upstream contracted activity and the downstream activity.
So what is going on here?
It would seem that the original complainant Zero-Now Limited had a case to complain if they are not also permitted to use the same topographic map data!
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Christopher Corbin
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Saturday 25 August 2007 10:34:51 am
Media interest in the Zero Now case grows
The Guardian newspaper’s Free Our Data Campaign published an article on the 23rd August tilted:
Website loses battle for public data access: Ruling denies Milton Keynes company access to information about local public services.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technol...nweeklytechnologysection.freeourdata
In response to the Guardian article mentioned above commentary appeared on the Paul Canning blog titled
Milton Keynes betrays Keynes
http://paulcanning.blogspot.com/2...08/milton-keynes-betrays-keynes.html
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Gerhard Wagner
Moderated by: Christopher Corbin
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Saturday 25 August 2007 10:13:59 pm
Licensing whole collections seems to frighten public data holders
In my mind, the request for partial re-use of PSI, even in the field of statutory registers and CHI, is quite harmless for public data holders.
But requesting the WHOLE set of a database or register (and putting very similar copies online, often non-authentic and therefore cheaper) is frightening public dataholders. They fear that users could mix up the public and the private version and finally address the complaints to them, although the service is being run by a private re-user.
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Paul Canning
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Wednesday 29 August 2007 9:42:46 pm
re: Media interest in the Zero Now case grows
Thanks for noticing my comments Christopher.
With regards to data holders concerns, they should take a lead from the Web and package content uses for other sites - for free. Some like Transport Direct already do.
Part of the problem is that consideration of the whole issue may be holding up use now of the part, and taking advantage of opportunities, as I point to.
You can see this as a half-way house to what The Guardian wants but a bit more entrepreneurship by data holders would help everybody.
Paul Canning
personal website
www.paulcanning.me.uk
web stuff and other ramblings
~~~~~~~~~~~
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Christian Lister
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Tuesday 18 September 2007 10:58:58 pm
flushed away?
'truth, like all other good things, may be loved unwisely - may be pursued too keenly - may cost too much'
Pearce v Pearce (1846)
data, like truth has the same inherent qualities.
If a PSIH decides competition is not a good market place, or the market place could detract from quality and at the same time allow the PSIH to enhance its own public product – the PSIH wins.
Not that I play – but I believe the term in poker is ‘a royal flush’
Flushing a re-user of your data from a PSIH is a great hand - allow the private sector to build a product/service which gains population popularity and then just simply withdraw the data or introduce pricing, a pricing matrix or pricing framework which suits the need.
The ZERO case – is a flush.
Allowing a re-user to create –
(a) the market
(b) the expertise
(c) the forum
(d) the concept and delivery
and to then snatch back all rights of re-use - the term ‘royal flush’ is extremely applicable.
Kind Regards,
Christian
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Christopher Corbin
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Wednesday 07 November 2007 7:50:07 pm
Milton Keynes Council reviews its position
The Milton Keynes Council Performance Review Panel met on the 24th October 2007 to consider its position with respect to the Council Web site and MK Web. Although the papers submitted to the panel could be considered as defensive a review is nevertheless underway. Some of the facts maybe not quite correct for example Zero-Now Ltd lodged a complaint with the UK Office of fair Trading as a competition issue not a public sector information re-use issue. A Memorandum of Understanding exists between the OFT and OPSI under which the OFT transferred the complaint to OPSI. Ie. A seamless complaint process. This is good practice.
Annex A to Item 6 of the meeting outlines the Councils approach:
“(v) All this led to a view that greater transparency and a more coherent set of governance policies was needed for the Council’s web site/web data, to define our approach to,
(i) The relationship with MK Web
(ii) Advertising on the Council web site
(iii) Equalities issues
(iv) Links to other sites, and,
(v) The re-use of Council Information
(w) Recognising the need for these new policies and for the associated procedures, work was commenced in August to create the policies and to place them before the Cabinet. Accordingly two Cabinet reports setting out the proposed policies, have been drafted and are targeted to go to the Cabinet on 6th November (item v on the reuse of Council Information includes not just web based information but hard copy printed material and has therefore been treated as a separate report).”
Milton Keynes Council has yet to comply with the UK PSI Regulations SI 1515, 2005.
The MK Web site still displays maps with the Milton Keynes Councils Ordnance Survey licence number on them.
There is still much to be done to address the issues itemised by the Council under (v) above. Perhaps it is all a little too late as it appears that Zero-Now Ltd has closed down.
The ePSIplus Thematic Network will continue to monitor this case in the context of the Directive 2003/98/EC. (UK: PSI Regulations No.1515, 2005)
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