A DIGITAL data capture project to run in Birmingham has been awarded a £30,000 grant by the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts.
The project is being jointly developed by the Digital Birmingham initiative and digital production company Mudlark, based in the Digbeth area of the city.
The scheme will create a ‘Civic Dashboard’ to help Birmingham City Council share the information held on its contact database in a way that benefits its citizens.
It is a web tool that will provide an online ‘heat map’ of requests raised by local residents, colour coded according to requests, which enables Birmingham people and the council to interact with live data and provides a forum for discussion of issues highlighted by the heat map.
This theme of open data is being explored at the Beyond 2010 conference on October 20 and 21, part of the Hello Digital week starting on October 18.
Simon Whitehouse, Digital Birmingham’s implementation manager, said: “Digital Birmingham is delighted to be developing our Birmingham Civic Dashboard with Mudlark.
“It will give us the opportunity to explore the practical use of linked data within a local authority, revealing local concerns and issues being raised through our customer relationship management database; but equally we’re looking forward to making use of our open data to create a range of conversations with Birmingham residents.”
The Beyond 2010 conference will be addressed by Professor Nigel Shadbolt, the Government’s transparency and open data advisor.
Professor Shadbolt is responsible for setting open data standards across the public sector and co-advising the Government on the data.gov.uk initiative.
His Beyond 2010 keynote speech will demonstrate how open data can help transform public services, explore the best strategic approaches and outline what future government policy will mean for public delivery.
Hello Digital takes places at various venues across Birmingham from October 18 – 22. To find out more about guest speakers and events taking place during the week visit hellodigital.net.
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