Data Science For Dummies, 3rd Edition

Chapter 19

Ten Phenomenal Resources for Open Data

IN THIS CHAPTER

Accessing open data from government sources

Getting data from the World Bank

Looking at private sources of open data

Exploring the world of open spatial data

Open data is part of a larger trend toward a less restrictive, more open understanding of the idea of intellectual property, a trend that’s been gaining tremendous popularity over the past decade. Think of open data as data that has been made publicly available and is permitted to be used, reused, built on, and shared with others. Maybe you’ve heard of open-source software, open hardware, open-content creative work, open access to scientific journals, and open science. Along with open data, they’re all part of the aptly named open movement — a movement committed to the notion that content (including raw data from experiments) should be shared freely.

The distinguishing feature of open licenses is that they have copyleft instead of copyright. With copyleft, the only restriction is that the source of the work must be identified, sometimes with the caveat that derivative ...