A short presentation about the ScraperWiki Hacks & Hackers Hack Days, plus some thoughts and info about opening up legal data

1. OPEN DATA & JOURNALISTS REBELLIOUS MEDIA CONFERENCE 2011 Judith Townend (@jtownend)

3. 12 Hacks & Hackers events around UK and Ireland, sponsored by local media and universities, BBC, the Guardian, Skillset, Vision+Media

4. Involved around 430 ‘hacks’ and ‘hackers’

6. Liverpool – x 2

7. Manchester

8. Leeds

9. Glasgow

10. Dublin

11. Belfast

12. Cardiff

13. Sutton

14. Lichfield

16. A technology platform that allows programmers to write and schedule screen scrapers and store the data they generate

18. HACK DAY IN ACTION http://vimeo.com/14086571 http://youtu.be/9kqfTzG3bgk

19. EXAMPLE STORY 1 ‘Leeds Uncut’ – winning project at Leeds Hacks & Hackers Hack Day, October 2010 A map showing eight Leeds constituencies in Leeds, highlighting how they’re being affected by spending cuts and redundancies Looked at job vacancies in each of the constituencies, to identify whether the creation of new jobs is offsetting the doom and gloom caused by spending cuts and job losses. Different shades of colour in the form of an “economic health thermometer” gave a visually effective overview of which constituencies are suffering the most and least Sources included data from: job websites, news websites, the Guardian’s Cutswatch page and the Office of National Statistics

22. OTHER EXAMPLES http://blog.scraperwiki.com http://blog.scraperwiki.com/tag/james-ball/ Coalition urged to act over lobbyists who use party groups 'to buy influence‘” by James Ball, The Guardian, 25.02.11 “Investigation reveals more than £1.6m was channelled to MPs and lords in last year by corporations and interest groups”

23. RESEARCHING THE COURTS Statement of case: available for a fee through courts (unless ‘sealed’) Judgments: many released on Bailii and other sites Court listings: some listed on HMCTS site Results: complicated…(see Perrin 2011) Reporting restrictions / court orders: no database Transcripts: only by authorised paid services Video and audio recordings: prohibited. Some official televising of Supreme Court cases (see Guardian)

24. FRUSTRATIONS Very little information is categorised or ‘tagged’, eg: by type of legal action Can be costly to access documents Release of data is patchy and inconsistent Some legal data only made available through paid-for services

25. WHY DO WE NEED DIGITAL OPEN JUSTICE? As the Master of the Rolls said: “The great strength of our society is that it is built on the competing voices of free speech. Justice to be truly open must join its voice to the chorus; and must ensure that inaccurate or misleading reporting cannot gain traction.” Source: http://blog.indexoncensorship.org/2011/03/21/open-justice-must-be-digital-too/, March 2011

26. CHALLENGING DISTORTION Conservative ‘Cat flap’ “... the answer to the question of whether this is a case where an “illegal immigrant… cannot be deported because… he had a pet cat” appears to be no .... the reason he was not deported was because he successfully showed he had a relationship with another person lasting over two years, not that he had a pet cat.” Adam Wagner, UK Human Rights Blog

28. http://crocodoc.com/ombGOOP

29. http://fullfact.org/blog/catgate_catflap_Daily_Mail_imigrant_bolivian_cat_deportation-3018Photo credit: MowT, Flickr

30. FUTURE FOR LEGAL DATA Open data consultation: deadline 27 October, 2011: http://discuss.bis.gov.uk/pdc/ Digital open justice Google Group: https://groups.google.com/group/digital-open-justice?pli=1 Ministry of Justice feedback: http://getsatisfaction.com/justicegovuk Suggestions?

31. CONTACT ME jt.townend@gmail.com @jtownend on Twitter http://meejalaw.com