Here’s something to chew on: the Canada Popcorn Company, a supplier of popcorn machines and related items, says Canadians consume about 1.6 billion quarts of popcorn a year.
Now popcorn would be just a pile of dried seed (fruit, actually) if wasn’t for the things that give it added value, namely heat and toppings. Heat turns the kernel inside out and fluffs it into something we can actually eat without breaking a tooth.
And the seemingly endless options for toppings — butter, herbs, powdered cheese — speaks to the abundant human capacity for invention, especially on an empty stomach.
In other words, popcorn is merely a platform, a starting point, for bigger and better things.
Oddly enough that brings us to the world of open data. The two — popcorn and open data — have something in common. Without creative people, all that good stuff inside stays locked up and useless.
What Canada’s Open Data Exchange (ODX) does is bring together some really bright, entrepreneurial thinkers to see what pops out when they apply the heat of innovation to open-data sets supplied by governments and other organizations.
Millions of these data sets exist around the world; millions more will be made available as governments become increasingly comfortable with the idea of putting information back in the hands of citizens who paid for it. Our own federal government has a catalogue of more than 250,000 data sets on subjects as wide-ranging as chronic diseases in Canada and languages spoken at work.
But data is meaningless without the expertise to extract knowledge from it. A electrocardiogram is just a data stream until the trained eye of a doctor makes sense of what it says about the condition of a heart. The knowledge in open data can prod us to adopt a healthier lifestyle. It could influence how we get to work. It might save lives.
Using information processed from raw data about traffic flows, urban planners can reduce congestion by retiming traffic signals or scheduling parking restrictions. Route changes based on open data can improve ambulance-response times.
This is where ODX sees the potential for new businesses and skills: in the refining and use of information to inform decisions that make our lives better.
ODX formed last year as partnership involving several players: the federal government, Communitech, the Canadian Digital Media Network, the University of Waterloo, D2L and OpenText. Based in Waterloo Region, Ont., ODX focuses on the national interest of ensuring that Canada places itself at the front of the global open-data movement.
The idea is to bring a thousand eyes to a problem, see opportunities differently and achieve results that aren't possible if information stays siloed and impenetrable.
There is a lot to do. Open data isn’t just an economic opportunity, it is a cultural shift that can’t be ignored. It’s complicated.
In the weeks ahead, this column will explore the possibilities open data presents, some of the issues open data raises about privacy and anonymity, and the role it plays in the new industrial revolution of connectivity.
Opening data for the sake of opening data is the wrong thing to do. Opening data for the purposes of solving problems, or going after opportunities for improving the quality of life, that’s a different story. That’s where the conversation should be.
So grab some popcorn. We’ve got plenty to talk about.
Kevin Tuer is Managing Director of Canada’s Open Data Exchange.
