When people start to ask the same questions
repeatedly, it's a sign that a community of interest is emerging, and that it
needs data standards. Here's an illustration from the open civic
data area, courtesy of Kevin Curry:
“The reason that a bunch of cities are talking bike share standards is because a bunch of cities have new bike share systems. More importantly, people have practical questions they want answered. Which stations are malfunctioning? What is the up/down time? When and where is the most usage? How does my city compare with other cities (like mine)? The reason inspection data — like the health of restaurants and hotels or the safety of buildings – is important is because every city does inspections (or pays someone to do them). Vacant and abandoned buildings? Check. Business licenses? Public parks? Yep and yep.”
Without standards, such questions can only be answered by making one-off investigations. Inevitably, such investigations tread more or less the same path. Over time, the trodden path from question to answer becomes known as “the current system”. Except, of course, that we're talking about lots of idiosyncratic paths – so it's lots of systems.
Create an inhouse standard and you save your own time and money. Adopt a community standard and you save everybody's time and money. Plus, you increase the value of your information by making it usable across the community. You also get to use the community's information to enhance your own knowledge. And the market you serve, or your business purpose, benefits.
Be on the lookout for repeated questions. They're a trigger for standards. Open Civic Data Standards
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