As part of the Declaration on open and transparent government the New Zealand Government has recently approved the “Principles for Managing Data and Information held by NZ Government”. These principles are all about making data open and accessible to the public, and commit agencies to actively release high value public data. The concept is to share government data and information, so that new uses can be made of them. Examples include large data sets held by GNS, LINZ and MED that could be combined to open up use of mineral assets.

Trish O’Kane and Clare Somerville jointly presented on aspects of the “Open Data” initiative including:

• Scope – where could Open Data begin and end?
• Does this initiative include documents and other information objects that are not normally in the public domain until transferred to Archives New Zealand?
• Is the data ready for sharing? Is it trustworthy and in the public domain?
• Does this conflict with only using data in accordance with the purpose for which it was captured?
• What about the risks of sharing information that could identify individuals?
• What do you have to do to get ready for Open Data?