Opening up to open data. But my mind seems closed to the idea.

Big data and open data. Concepts everyone is talking about it would seem.

Both are very interesting topics, with a potential of big data to change the very way we see the world.

And with open data, a potential for business opportunities often with some large caveats around privacy etc.

However, as TechCruch reports, today another step along the road to liberating government data across the region so that startups can get their hands on it: as an EU committee made up of member states’ representatives has endorsed plans to modernise the 2003 public information directive to make all non-personal public sector info available for reuse.

Opening up public sector data is something the EC believes will help European startups and businesses by providing access to valuable data at “zero or very low cost”:

Following today’s committee endorsement, the next stage in the process will be for the European Parliament to approve the new rules.

Back in 2011 when it proposed to revise the public data directive, the EC projected that its Open Data Strategy will end up injecting €40 billion annually to the EU’s economy, driving growth and jobs.

The revised directive will include a right to reuse public information; expand the remit to include libraries, museums and archives; create a transparent pricing framework for reproduction, provision and dissemination of the information which also aims to keep costs to a marginal minimum; and encourage data to be made available in open machine-readable formats.

This only happened today (10 April 2013) so yesterday's event with the Technology Strategy Board event held by Techcelrate was rather well timed.

However, for me I realised that being a creative type, working in mobile marketing, that I simply wouldn't get some of the language used or terminology or even the concepts. And I didn't understand the business case.

With Open data, the public sector giving business access to all the data it has in many areas, makes sense for start ups to use it to make money for themselves. Got it - there are a number who have already like... Numberhood.

My issue I suppose is the second part of the equation - that the public sector will swap data with the private sector hoping that private sector cash will recycle it and add value to it and then it back to them mixed with their own data as well.

I just don't GET why a private sector organisation would do this?

On the one hand it might be very commercially sensitive and on the other hand it might be illegal!

I understand how the private sector (which I am part of with Great Marketing Works and mobile app development) has it's own BIG data opportunity. As over the years, even though the backlash has been said to have been coming, the world has given data to private companies freely and easily. Either with intent i.e. swapping almost meaningless things like points and discounts for their buying habits data or unintentionally by going to websites with cookies in them and being followed around the internet.

This has changed whole industries and created new winners in landscapes are varied as in retail grocery shopping i.e. with Tesco's rise to the top due to loyalty cards and subsequent business intelligence of their demographics to Facebook PPC advertising mechanisms and the intention economy.

Both for the record, I am a great believer of. In part as the knowledge of the cutting edge marketing of them has given me a living :)

The next level I suppose would be open data mixing with such private data to give use multiple data sets from several sources to find gold in them there hills (or perhaps another metaphor would be data being the new oil - which seems to be said a lot.)

It is simply that I do not get if the private sector has all the cards - why would it want to play with the public?