Open data - Topics

Crash data from NHTSA is public but state level fatality records take a year to publish Data.gov hosts hundreds of thousands of federal datasets and many are stale by years MuckRock users file thousands of FOIA requests a year and publish every response Publishing a PDF is not publishing open data Anonymizing census microdata until whole towns disappear What does an open license actually permit for commercial reuse? Open government data portals publish files nobody can join to anything EU open data portal vs national portals: coverage gaps for regional statistics Research data centers charge for access and call it sustainability Machine-readable formats matter more than the portal search box A catalog record tells you the file exists but not whether it is any good What belongs in a dataset README? Land parcel boundaries should be free at the point of use Choosing a projection for a map that has to be legally defensible Satellite imagery archives are free and still underused Volunteered geographic information fills gaps that official maps ignore Who pays for maintaining an open dataset after the grant ends? Government APIs beat bulk downloads for anything that changes daily Agencies charge for the data they were already paid to collect An open data office with no budget and no mandate Funding a statistical agency through a political cycle A cadastral boundary line that runs through someone's living room Open data can be turned against the people it describes Research funders require data sharing and reviewers rarely check Open by default fails without a standard for what stays closed Weather and climate records from NOAA are free but raw station data needs a separate request Where to pull thirty years of monthly unemployment statistics without a subscription