3 ms·

Officials Hoard Valuable Databases Funded by Taxpayers

16 points by naish 18y ago

jodrellblank 18y ago
Officials hoard valuable money funded by taxpayers. Reddit snark aside, I'm kind of glad about this - innocent people are going to get trampled in the rush to webtwoise masses of data, it's rumoured to be happening already with allegations of robberies planned on google maps/streetview. If it's a national security issue to release details of government buildings, then isn't it a personal security issue if overhead plans of your house are suddenly massively public?
- Brushfire 18y ago
  I'm not glad. The only way we can make logical decisions on anything these days is with data. The data is in these databases. Besides, this information is already available in inferior forms. To the public. Why should we have to deal with inferior forms if we paid for it? We are entitled to the right to assess how well our government is doing AT EVERYTHING it does. And we generally will need data to assess, otherwise we have to trust what they tell us blindly. The potential scope of information and insight we are missing out on here is enormous. Further, I'm all for personal privacy. But I'm not for privacy as an excuse when it doesn't apply. When government officials use privacy as a reason, that usually indicates to me that they have something to hide. It is very straightforward to allow anonymized access that sanitizes personal information out of any database that contains private information. Or aggregate it on metrics that make sense.
  - chris11 18y ago
    I agree with you. I'd even go as far as saying that some data should be freely provided to companies to be resold. It would allow businesses to make better products, and give them an incentive to help customers better use the data. I'd like to say that I'm only ok with public data being given to companies when there are no major privacy concerns. I'm not ok with the state selling lists of people's phone numbers who aren't on the Do Not Call list to telemarkers. I'm more referring to a recent story where a town in Michigan blocked a company from getting information on parking spots from their website.
  - Vivtek 18y ago
    If privacy is an issue, then the government shouldn't be collecting the information in the first place. That's where the privacy issue should be examined -- otherwise, they're saying your privacy is for sale if the bid is sufficiently high. And that just isn't privacy.
- eli 18y ago
  The data still exists and it is still collated. It's just recompiled through unnecessary manual expenses by a database vendor and then sold to marketers or anyone else who can afford it. The only people who DON'T have access to the data are regular taxpayers like you and me.
- eli 18y ago
  Data is either public or its not. Would you prefer to live in a world where there's no way to compare your house's tax assessment against your neighbors? Dontcha think that might lead to some problems?
  - jrmurad 18y ago
    I'd prefer to live in a world without any tax assessment on my house or my neighbors. Problem averted.

16 points by naish 18y ago

Officials hoard valuable money funded by taxpayers. Reddit snark aside, I'm kind of glad about this - innocent people are going to get trampled in the rush to webtwoise masses of data, it's rumoured to be happening already with allegations of robberies planned on google maps/streetview. If it's a national security issue to release details of government buildings, then isn't it a personal security issue if overhead plans of your house are suddenly massively public?

Brushfire 18y ago
I'm not glad. The only way we can make logical decisions on anything these days is with data. The data is in these databases. Besides, this information is already available in inferior forms. To the public. Why should we have to deal with inferior forms if we paid for it? We are entitled to the right to assess how well our government is doing AT EVERYTHING it does. And we generally will need data to assess, otherwise we have to trust what they tell us blindly. The potential scope of information and insight we are missing out on here is enormous. Further, I'm all for personal privacy. But I'm not for privacy as an excuse when it doesn't apply. When government officials use privacy as a reason, that usually indicates to me that they have something to hide. It is very straightforward to allow anonymized access that sanitizes personal information out of any database that contains private information. Or aggregate it on metrics that make sense.
- chris11 18y ago
  I agree with you. I'd even go as far as saying that some data should be freely provided to companies to be resold. It would allow businesses to make better products, and give them an incentive to help customers better use the data. I'd like to say that I'm only ok with public data being given to companies when there are no major privacy concerns. I'm not ok with the state selling lists of people's phone numbers who aren't on the Do Not Call list to telemarkers. I'm more referring to a recent story where a town in Michigan blocked a company from getting information on parking spots from their website.
- Vivtek 18y ago
  If privacy is an issue, then the government shouldn't be collecting the information in the first place. That's where the privacy issue should be examined -- otherwise, they're saying your privacy is for sale if the bid is sufficiently high. And that just isn't privacy.
eli 18y ago
The data still exists and it is still collated. It's just recompiled through unnecessary manual expenses by a database vendor and then sold to marketers or anyone else who can afford it. The only people who DON'T have access to the data are regular taxpayers like you and me.
eli 18y ago
Data is either public or its not. Would you prefer to live in a world where there's no way to compare your house's tax assessment against your neighbors? Dontcha think that might lead to some problems?
- jrmurad 18y ago
  I'd prefer to live in a world without any tax assessment on my house or my neighbors. Problem averted.