3 ms·

A city shouldn't have to deal with Google. Google is a company and should provide a reasonable service or no service at all.

by LunaSea 12y ago

TeMPOraL 12y ago
Google needs timetable data, and since they're a company, they can't just go and scrap the timetables from the official website and call it a day. They have to arrange for whoever runs the public transport system to provide this data, and sometimes the city refuses.
- LunaSea 12y ago
  For Google Maps, they used satellite imaging and cars with cameras. They didn't ask the government to give them the information / data besides the necessary permits. A company can't just expect that the data holders will blindly comply with them because the result would be an improvement over the current solution.
  - maxerickson 12y ago
    Google Maps makes huge use of government data (particularly in the US where the government makes detailed imagery available under a free license). I'm also confused what your point is. TeMPOraL expressed an opinion but having this data available in Google Maps and Google now would be strictly better. That isn't a forceful argument that cities must comply with the demands of Google, but you seem to be answering it as if it were. Using your words, it's a lamentation that Google provides no service at all.
    - LunaSea 12y ago
      I was reacting to TeMPOraL in that way because it felt like there was some kind of entitlement for the data. Public entities ow the data to nobody and especially not to companies. For sure, it would be great if city administrations and public entities did have some kind of API but the overhead would be just too big to justify the cost. Having commercial partners for those APIs would be one way to fund it but I don't think that it would be a sustainable model world-wide.
      - maxerickson 12y ago
        I disagree, public entities owe the data to their users. (especially if we are talking about entities that receive government funding or offer a public service under some limited license) I think my attitude is widespread: https://developers.google.com/transit/gtfs/ https://developers.google.com/transit/gtfs/ https://code.google.com/p/googletransitdatafeed/wiki/PublicFeeds https://code.google.com/p/googletransitdatafeed/wiki/PublicF... That's a Google effort, but it is pragmatic, it opens the data for more than just Google.
        LunaSea 12y ago
        I agree with the idea that the data should be open to the public. Research funded by public grants should be in the same category as well. But as a developer I know how quickly the technologies and developer needs change. There are often threads on the front page of HN and /r/programming about the technology turnover being too quick. From this practical point of view I find it difficult to see how an public entity could justify funding for stuff like this. Also using companies like Google as an example for data-openness is not the best argument. API bait-and-switches are just too common these days.
        icebraining 12y ago
        Technology turnover is irrelevant, programmers are well used to extracting data from old systems. Anything good nowadays will be good enough in 20 years (e.g. XML is from '98, and still vastly used).
        maxerickson 12y ago
        I didn't use Google as an example, I used that particular effort as an example. It involves dozens of transit providers opening their data, with no intermediate reliance on Google. As far as the spending, the public entity already has to have some sort of record of their scheduling. The justification for sharing it is simply that making things easier to use increases use of them. Perhaps that isn't the case, but it shouldn't take months of time to set up a system to dump an existing database, so for systems with thousands of users it should not be a significant expense.
  - jsight 12y ago
    That's not entirely true. A lot of public government data is fed into the creation of Google Maps.
- virmundi 12y ago
  Why can't they? The information is publicly available. It's probably not in a normalized format (like you'd get from following schema.org). It is however HTML data that can be contextualized by algorithm and by human. Why can't they scrape it, open it and allow users to review/update it? They provide some of that process with Google Maps. A Good Will in my town moved. The map was wrong. I said, "Nope, it's over here". Within about 4 hrs, it was moved.
matt4077 12y ago
A city should release data such as public transport timetables in a machine-readable format with a public domain license.
- LunaSea 12y ago
  As a developer I agree whole heartedly that it would be much more convenient if they did but you can't just expect public and semi-public entities to follow technological trends without getting a share of the benefits.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]

A city shouldn't have to deal with Google. Google is a company and should provide a reasonable service or no service at all.

by LunaSea 12y ago

A city shouldn't have to deal with Google. Google is a company and should provide a reasonable service or no service at all.

TeMPOraL 12y ago

Google needs timetable data, and since they're a company, they can't just go and scrap the timetables from the official website and call it a day. They have to arrange for whoever runs the public transport system to provide this data, and sometimes the city refuses.

LunaSea 12y ago
For Google Maps, they used satellite imaging and cars with cameras. They didn't ask the government to give them the information / data besides the necessary permits. A company can't just expect that the data holders will blindly comply with them because the result would be an improvement over the current solution.
- maxerickson 12y ago
  Google Maps makes huge use of government data (particularly in the US where the government makes detailed imagery available under a free license). I'm also confused what your point is. TeMPOraL expressed an opinion but having this data available in Google Maps and Google now would be strictly better. That isn't a forceful argument that cities must comply with the demands of Google, but you seem to be answering it as if it were. Using your words, it's a lamentation that Google provides no service at all.
  - LunaSea 12y ago
    I was reacting to TeMPOraL in that way because it felt like there was some kind of entitlement for the data. Public entities ow the data to nobody and especially not to companies. For sure, it would be great if city administrations and public entities did have some kind of API but the overhead would be just too big to justify the cost. Having commercial partners for those APIs would be one way to fund it but I don't think that it would be a sustainable model world-wide.
    - maxerickson 12y ago
      I disagree, public entities owe the data to their users. (especially if we are talking about entities that receive government funding or offer a public service under some limited license) I think my attitude is widespread: https://developers.google.com/transit/gtfs/ https://developers.google.com/transit/gtfs/ https://code.google.com/p/googletransitdatafeed/wiki/PublicFeeds https://code.google.com/p/googletransitdatafeed/wiki/PublicF... That's a Google effort, but it is pragmatic, it opens the data for more than just Google.
      - LunaSea 12y ago
        I agree with the idea that the data should be open to the public. Research funded by public grants should be in the same category as well. But as a developer I know how quickly the technologies and developer needs change. There are often threads on the front page of HN and /r/programming about the technology turnover being too quick. From this practical point of view I find it difficult to see how an public entity could justify funding for stuff like this. Also using companies like Google as an example for data-openness is not the best argument. API bait-and-switches are just too common these days.
        icebraining 12y ago
        Technology turnover is irrelevant, programmers are well used to extracting data from old systems. Anything good nowadays will be good enough in 20 years (e.g. XML is from '98, and still vastly used).
        maxerickson 12y ago
        I didn't use Google as an example, I used that particular effort as an example. It involves dozens of transit providers opening their data, with no intermediate reliance on Google. As far as the spending, the public entity already has to have some sort of record of their scheduling. The justification for sharing it is simply that making things easier to use increases use of them. Perhaps that isn't the case, but it shouldn't take months of time to set up a system to dump an existing database, so for systems with thousands of users it should not be a significant expense.
- jsight 12y ago
  That's not entirely true. A lot of public government data is fed into the creation of Google Maps.
virmundi 12y ago
Why can't they? The information is publicly available. It's probably not in a normalized format (like you'd get from following schema.org). It is however HTML data that can be contextualized by algorithm and by human. Why can't they scrape it, open it and allow users to review/update it? They provide some of that process with Google Maps. A Good Will in my town moved. The map was wrong. I said, "Nope, it's over here". Within about 4 hrs, it was moved.

matt4077 12y ago

A city should release data such as public transport timetables in a machine-readable format with a public domain license.

LunaSea 12y ago
As a developer I agree whole heartedly that it would be much more convenient if they did but you can't just expect public and semi-public entities to follow technological trends without getting a share of the benefits.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]