In September 2019 I spoke at the SciCAR conference in Dortmund, Germany about the experiences of working in a country with well developed open data policies — and the dangers it presents for data journalists.

1. SciCAR 2019
#OpenDataUtopia
@PaulBradshaw
Birmingham City University, BBC Data Unit

2. 1. The exciting journey to
open data utopia
2. Encountering curious
creatures
3. Wizards and unicorns

3. Kapitel 1: “Eine Armee
von ‘armchair auditors’”

4. "Raw Data Now"

5. Guardian, 2009

7. Gordon Brown -> David Cameron

8. https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20130104174825/http://www.number10.gov.uk/news/letter-to-government-departments-on-opening-up-data/

10. https://www.cogitatiopress.com/mediaandcommunication/article/view/128
(Appelgren & Salaverria 2018)
“National and EU legislation in both nations [Sweden
and Spain] shape journalistic strategies for accessing
data, turning journalists at times into activists fighting
for the right to access public data. Beyond the law, data
journalists advocate for a transparency culture among
the civil servants, in order to secure public
accountability.”

13. Eric Pickles

14. Kapitel 2: Eine Reise durch
unergründetes Gebiet

15. https://github.com/bbc-data-unit

17. Das Problem der Vogelscheuche

18. DATA.POLICE.U
K

19. DATA.POLICE.U
K
>
2,400
C
SV
s, 37
m
illion
row
s

22. “In solving a problem efficiently, we might further ask
whether an approximate solution is good enough,
whether we can use randomization to our advantage,
and whether false positives or false negatives are
allowed. Computational thinking is reformulating a
seemingly difficult problem into one we know how to
solve, perhaps by reduction, embedding,
transformation, or simulation.”
https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~15110-s13/Wing06-ct.pdf
(Wing 2004)

23. https://github.com/paulbradshaw/commandline/blob/master/movingfiles.md

24. https://github.com/paulbradshaw/commandline/blob/master/movingfiles.md
Pattern
recognition

25. https://cloud.google.com/bigquery/what-is-bigquery

26. https://github.com/BBC-Data-Unit/unsolved-crime

27. https://environment.data.gov.uk/catchment-planning/

29. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-49131405

30. https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/winter-daily-sitreps/winter-daily-sitrep-2018-19-data/

31. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-48624554
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-41483322

32. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-48624554
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-41483322O
pen
data
—
or accessible
data?

34. 2.

35. Das Blechmann-
Problem

36. https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/revealed-five-bbs-being-paid-15257915.amp

37. https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/revealed-five-bbs-being-paid-15257915.amp

38. https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/scandal-160-families-stranded-city-15257666

40. Das Löwenproblem

44. https://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answers-statements/written-question/Commons/2016-02-11/27175/

46. https://github.com/BBC-Data-Unit/electric-car-charging-pointshttps://github.com/BBC-Data-Unit/electric-car-charging-points

48. https://twitter.com/au_tom_otive/status/1114600415964872704
https://github.com/BBC-Data-Unit/electric-car-charging-points

49. Kapitel 3: Treffen Sie
den Zauberer

50. The Bureau of Investigative Journalism

51. https://conservative-speeches.sayit.mysociety.org/speech/601355

53. https://web.archive.org/web/20140428001326/http://www.deloitte.com/assets/Dcom-UnitedKingdom/Local%20Assets/Documents/Market%20insights/

54. https://web.archive.org/web/20140428001326/http://www.deloitte.com/assets/Dcom-UnitedKingdom/Local%20Assets/Documents/Market%20insights/

55. https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=120&v=UNQteT9Bu2w

56. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-39102860

57. https://github.com/BBC-Data-Unit/academytransparency

58. https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-42611365

59. https://www.theguardian.com/education/2019/apr/09/cash-strapped-english-schools-turn-to-online-donations-to-close-funding-gap

60. https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/revealed-five-bbs-being-paid-15257915.amp

61. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-47059450

62. https://www.cogitatiopress.com/mediaandcommunication/article/view/128
“At first sight, working with data promises to challenge
the regime, in part by taking a more conventionalist or
interpretivist epistemological position with regard to the
representation of truth. However, we argue that how
journalists and other actors choose to work with data
may in some ways deepen the regime's
epistemological stance.”
(Lesage & Hackett 2014)

63. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-47059450

64. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/feb/25/english-councils-accused-of-hiding-scale-of-homelessness-crisis

66. https://onlinejournalismblog.com/2017/08/07/10-principles-for-data-journalism-in-its-second-decade/

67. https://onlinejournalismblog.com/2017/08/07/10-principles-for-data-journalism-in-its-second-decade/

69. https://academic.oup.com/bjc/article/54/2/222/372562
“It is increasingly the case that it simply does not make
sense to think about certain types of crime in terms of
our conventional notions of space. Cybercrime,
white-collar financial crime, transnational terrorism,
fraud and identity theft all have very real local (and
global) consequences, yet ‘take place’ within, through or
across the ‘space of flows’ (Castells 1996). Such
a-spatial or inter-spatial crime is invariably omitted
from conventional crime maps.”
(Kindynis 2014)

70. https://www.pinterest.com/pin/405816616396551657/

71. Danke.
@PaulBradshaw, Birmingham City University
Online Journalism Blog, BBC England data unit