Using Public Data

to Drive

Innovation 22nd November 2012

The Department of Public Expenditure & Reform and Dublinked jointly hosted an event to explore the potential of Open Data for the Public Sector. On the day attendees heard from industry experts, practitioners and entrepreneurs in the field of open data. Attendees received an introduction to and an overview of open data in Ireland. The aim of this event was to provide interested parties with an understanding of the value this data has to entrepreneurs and to identify the benefits of open data for the public bodies.

Speakers on the day included:

Martin Troy & John Foley - Towards an Open Data Policy for the Irish Public Service

Department of Public Expenditure and Reform

Martin Troy is with the eGovernment Policy Unity and John is with the Training Policy Unit of the Department

of Public Expenditure and Reform. Martin & John will present ‘Towards an Open Data Policy for the Irish

Public Service’

Dominic Byrne - Open Data in Ireland to date Assistant Head of IT, Fingal County Council Dominic Byrne is Assistant Head of Information Technology with Fingal County Council and has 20 years of

experience in IT. He is responsible for managing the provision of IT services in Fingal and his current interests

include Open Data, Open Government, Social Media, and Knowledge Management. He is responsible for Fingal

Open Data which was the first Open Government Data website in Ireland and is also a member of the

Dublinked management team.

Joan Mulvihill - Open Data - Innovation and Entrepreneurship

CEO, Irish Internet Association

With 8 years of retail experience within the Kingfisher Group (retail) in London and Amsterdam, returned to

Dublin in 2002 and joined Becton Dickinson's global sourcing team with procurement responsibilities for car

leasing and marketing across Europe and the US. Exactly three years later, moved to senior consulting role

within leading international professional services firm, BDO International, as Head of Family Business

consulting services.

Was appointed CEO of the Irish Internet Association in November 2009 and is privileged to work with the best

and brightest of technology start-ups as well as supporting more traditional businesses in the adoption of web-

based technologies. Over the past three years, the IIA has led new initiatives such as Digitise the Nation to

bridge the digital divide, as well a policy papers addressing the Digital Skills Shortage and Open-Data and

driving business growth through Digital Marketing, eCommerce and Cloud Computing.

Jason Roe- Parking Made Easier with ParkYa

Entrepreneur, ParkYA

Jason Roe is an entrepreneur with a flare for developing innovative products and solutions. Since 2011, his team has

been working on ParkYa, a product that helps drivers to find on street parking & make payments. The development

of this product has been driven by of the Open Data movement supported by Dublinked. With support from

Enterprise Ireland and Local Government, Parkya have opened registration for the private trail of their parking app.

ParkYa, its Parking Made Easier!

Eoin Bailey - Open-ish Data Case Studies

Researcher, Trinity College Dublin; Co-founder, Hit The Road

Eoin Bailey is a computer science researcher in Trinity College Dublin working with cultural data collections

and is also involved in Hit The Road a multi-modal public transport journey planner for Dublin. Eoin worked

with open data to build the Irish Property Price map, a tool that allows simple interactions with the released

Property Price Register information. A key part of Eoin's research is to broaden the access to data sets, both

visual and textual, enabling explorative research and interaction by users of all skill levels.

Deirdre Ni Raghallaigh - Give up yer auld data The Studio, Dublin City Council

Deirdre Ni Raghallaigh heads up the Studio – Dublin City Council’s in-house innovation unit. The studio works

on redesigning public services; developing new forms of public engagement; testing ideas new to the council

as well as co-founding Dublinked . Deirdre has worked previously for the City as a business librarian, press

officer, communications manager and in area management in the North Inner City.

Ton Zijlstra - Making Open Data work for the public sector in Europe

Project Lead & Community Steward; European Public Sector Information Platform

Ton Zijlstra (1970) is a self-employed change management consultant from the Netherlands, with a preference

for complex change issues. He has a background in technology and philosophy. With 15+ years experience in

knowledge management and change management issues he has a keen interest in creating new affordances

for professionals in the context of their communities and groups.

Since 2008 he has been active on open (government) data which he sees as a next wave of digital disruption

provoking new challenges for public sector bodies, citizens and corporations alike. He worked and works for

various local, national and international government bodies to help 'do' open data, and also as an activist. In

2009 he wrote a first exploration of open data for the Dutch government, and in 2010 the first plans for a

Dutch national data portal (data.overheid.nl). In 2008 he was one of the co-initiators of the Dutch open data

activist group 'Hack de Overheid' (Hack the government). In his home town Enschede he started a local open

data group, and is volunteering his time to the city government using the motto "you can pay me by publishing

data sets". As project lead and community steward of the ePSIplatform (http://epsiplatform.eu) he is an active

connector and enabler of open data across the EU, under a contract with the European Commission. He is a

regular speaker across Europe.

Ton is also a board member of the 6000+ community Ambtenaar 2.0 (Civil Servant 2.0) in the Netherlands

which focuses on changing the work routines of the public sector under influence of social media, co-creation

and open data.

What participants

said:

“varied topics, very interesting”

“good overview and examples”

“Excellent and very relevant ”

“Got the latest on PSI; better

understanding of open data

community”

“Great, well paced event”

“very informative”

“excellent range of speakers and

content”

“Highlighted and explained points clearly, great networking

opportunity and hear of open data examples”

“Fantastic background on latest development in open data”

“Great to hear from current innovative projects, providing real

examples of the potential of using open data”

“I discovered new really interesting data sources and datasets”

“Good background about current government open data

initiatives”

Tweets from ‘Using Public Data to Drive Innovation’ Event:

Click here to view archive of tweets from ‘Using Data to Drive Innovation’ Event

Callan Institute National University of Ireland Maynooth Maynooth County Kildare Ireland

www.dublinked.ie dublinked@nuim.ie Twitter: @dublinked

About Dublinked

Dublinked, a new regional data sharing initiative sees previously unreleased public operational data

being made available online for others to research or reuse. With the initial data coming from Dublin

City Council and Dun Laoghaire Rathdown, South Dublin and Fingal County Councils, it is expected that

other public and private organisations in Dublin will link up with Dublinked to share their data and

invite research collaborations. The information is curated by NUI Maynooth to ensure ideas can be

commercialised as easily as possible and to minimise legal or technical barriers that can be

impediments for small and medium businesses (SMEs) seeking to develop and prove business ideas.

If you would like to hear about future Dublinked events, send an email to dublinked@nuim.ie to join

our mailing list.