One Man and His Blog

"The money goes to the cash cows, not the cash calf," explains one former Flickr team member. If Flickr couldn't make bucks, it wouldn't get bucks (or talent, or resources).

Because Flickr wasn't as profitable as some of the other bigger properties, like Yahoo Mail or Yahoo Sports, it wasn't given the resources that were dedicated to other products. That meant it had to spend its resources on integration, rather than innovation. Which made it harder to attract new users, which meant it couldn't make as much money, which meant (full circle) it didn't get more resources. And so it goes.

As a result of being resource-starved, Flickr quit planting the anchors it needed to climb ever higher. It missed the boat on local, on real time, on mobile, and even ultimately on social--the field it pioneered. And so, it never became the Flickr of video; YouTube snagged that ring. It never became the Flickr of people, which was of course Facebook. It remained the Flickr of photos. At least, until Instagram came along.

As a recent evictee from the big corporate world, who spends some of his time working for big corporates, I'm still fascinated by the problems these huge companies face in adapting to times of massive change. 

I noted this post by Seth Godin a few weeks back:

This is a sure sign of systemic failure as well as a CEO who is not doing the job she should be. When smart people who care get frustrated, something is wrong.

I recognised that feeling - that of caring about the company, and of seeing solutions which I just couldn't get implemented, because the people around me weren't in touch enough with what was happening outside their tight niche to see that the threats and opportunities were coming from elsewhere.

And then I saw this yesterday:

AirPlay, a software tool included with Apple's iPads and iPhones, is widely viewed as being potentially disruptive to the cable industry, because it makes it easy for people to view a broad variety of Internet content on a television. Time Warner Cable's leader, however, hasn't heard of it.

And that's the core problem, isn't it? A CEO who has worked his or her way up the company, in a different age, with a different set of challenges. They're not in-touch enough to know what the new landscape is. And they're not smart enough to listen to those people further down the company who are much more keenly aware of the true competitive landscape. So, it's both a systemic and a personal problem, as Godin suggests.

Try this thought experiment: imagine walking up to your CEO, if you work for a publishing business, and asking him to name his top five sites that didn't come from a traditional media background. If you can't imagine him giving sensible answers, start looking for another job. 

John L. Robinson spots a great observation about journalism by Stijn Debrouwere:

Because the entire point is that journalism is not being disrupted by better journalism but by things that are hardly recognizable as journalism at all. Stepping up your game is always a good idea, but it won't save you.

It's a spot on observation. 

The trick is going to be ways of finding the core values and skills of what we call journalism, and finding whole new ways of expressing them in a totally different medium.

You up to that?

Berlin. Possibly the throbbing heart of continental Europe's digital scene. Certainly the scene of one of my most over-written opening paragraphs in years. But then, what else can a city like this stimulate in you? One of the opening parties last night featured a woman dressed as a peacock. That's all you need to know.

Oh, perhaps you also need to know that I'm here for NEXT Berlin, the annually digital conference that I enjoyed so much last year. And, like last year, I'll be liveblogging it. Unlike last year, I won't be liveblogging it here - I'll be posting on the official NEXT Blog, which I've been running since January...

Not quite sure what will be appearing here - probably some analysis, random photography. And possibly peacock ladies:

Dr Laura James, foundation coordinator of the Open Knowledge Foundation

What is open data? asks Dr James. They have the Open Definition. Open data is open. You can use it whatever organisation you're in. Data? Not personal data. There shouldn't be any personal privacy issues (most of the time).

We have lots of data, and powerful IT systems. To many eyes, all data problems will be fixed. Data needs to be open to be interwoven. It doesn't need to be semantic - it can be - but it does need to be well enough described to weave it with other information. You'll need a range of skills: developers, designers, ethnographers, to get the most from the data. But open data means we can scale.

We're in really early days for this. It's still new in government - it's barely heard of in business. There are whole new sets of activities - like data wrangling - that bring new costs. Many of those costs are because we're retrofitting open onto existing data.

This is scary disruption. We get to experiment, take risks and occasionally succeed.

Open data leads to more sustainable cities. You understand more about what's happening - so it's easier to get all kinds of organisations to work together to solve the problems.  Who can make the city data useful to people? Startups, SMEs, schools, arts groups, libraries - open data brings them all together. The UK government now shares transactions over £25k monthly. Before they released this data, civil servants couldn't access it. Now they can - so civil servants can see where better deals are to be had.

But it's not a magic potion. It's got to be used  - it needs individuals and organisations to build apps and services to allow it to be accessed and used. We need to collect advice around using it. And if it's open data - you want open tools. And that means open source software. Select a robust open source software project, and you have a sustainable project. You don't need to worry about a propriety vendor putting up prices or going bust. The code is free - services probably won't be. That's fine. Pay more, get better service.

We went from hand-writing html to content management systems, like WordPress. Now we need to go from hand-managed data to data management systems. And there will be a whole range of them, from propriety to open source, from basic to expert. They'll allow management, analysis, proven ace checking, data cleaning... They'll be used right through the lifespan of that data.

CKAN - an open data management system. What's it good for? Sharing, finding and using data. For example - http://publicdata.eu, http://thedatahub.org. dataGM.org - mentioned earlier - was built on it. And it's not just the Open Knowledge Foundation - you can download it yourself, work with other partners, etc.

Opening data can be good for your organisation. wheredoesmymoneygo.org had a lot of downtime when they first launched - and the treasury kept phoning to complain. It was the best way of accessing their own information...

Ian Holt, senior developer programme manager at Ordnance Survey

Two years ago the OS was asked to release mapping data as open data for the first time.

They have data, tools and a network, GeoVation, which is underpinned by their data. They offer location data for Great Britain which supports web and mobile access models by developers. Comes under the "very permissive" open government license. You can grab the data from OS OpenData. When it was first launched, all you could do was get the data. In the years they've been running the API, they've realised you need more than that - like examples of how people have used it, and forums for discussing working methods and problems.

The data's a mix of contextual products - which look like maps - and more analytical data, like boundary lines.

Examples of use:

icoast - created a product with activities along the Dorset coast.

Free iPhone app for Winchester Hat Fair.

Facebook.com/nationaltreasures - game using the data

Most used data sets: OS Street View, OS VectorMap District Raster, and OS VectorMap District Vector.

The analytical stuff is accessed less. How can they encourage more use? Or is it a phased thing? When another data set is released, suddenly the others might become more relevant.

Biggest learning? Just releasing the dataset is not the same a getting people to use it. You need to communicate about it, and you need to provide tools. And data is not just for developers - you need to think about who else might want to use it, and how they will need to engage with it. For example, a wizard that allows you to build a map with markers on it...

You can incentivise people to use the data through global competitions. They've also run workshops called "Open Data Master Classes" - they encourage use of both OS and other government data sets.

GeoVation has a challenge process, which encourages people to pitch solutions to problems. The best ideas are invited to GeoVation camps, and the winners get money to produce their solutions. They've just closed a transforming neighbourhoods project. One around the Welsh Costal Path is running now.

Remember: publication is not the same as communication. And that goes both ways; they like to hear (and publicise) how people are using the data.