Integrating Europe's PSI re-use rules - Demystifying the maze

Computer Law and Security Review

Volumn 27, Issue 1, 2011, Pages 68-74

  De Vries, Marc ^a  

^a Citadel Consulting   (Netherlands)

Author keywords

Access to official information; EU PSI policy; PSI directive; Public sector information; Re use of PSI

Indexed keywords

ACCESS TO OFFICIAL INFORMATION; EU PSI POLICY; PSI DIRECTIVE; PUBLIC SECTOR INFORMATION; RE-USE OF PSI;

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY; INFORMATION USE; RHENIUM COMPOUNDS;

LAWS AND LEGISLATION;

EID: 79551523707     PISSN: 02673649     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1016/j.clsr.2010.11.010     Document Type: Article

References (20)

1. See for an overview of more reports and surveys and key figures: (1) Review of the PSI Directive (Brussels, 7.5.2009 COM (2009) 212 final), pp. 5-8, http://eurlex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=COM:2009:0212:FIN:EN:PDF and more extensively (2) Uhlir, P.F., Sharif R.M., and Mer T. (2009), Measuring the Social and Economic Costs and Benefits of Public Sector Information Online: A Review of the Literature and Future Directions in: Uhlir, P. (ed.). The socioeconomic effects of Public Sector Information on Digital Networks. Towards a better understanding of different access and re-use policies, a workshop summary (pp. 62-64), Washington DC: National Research Council http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record-id=12687&page=61
2. Directive 2003/98/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 November 2003 on the re-use of public sector information, http://eur-lex.europa. eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:32003L0098:EN:HTML.
3. Brussels, 7.5.2009 COM (2009) 212 final, http://eur-lex.europa.eu/ LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=COM:2009:0212:FIN:EN:PDF.
4. See also Janssen, K, (2010), One Information Policy for Freedom of Information and Re-use: http://blog.okfn.org/2010/07/21/oneinformation-policy- for-freedom-of-information-and-re-use/.
5. This is the underlying principle of the PSI Directive. According to consideration 25, the objectives are: "to facilitate the creation of Community-wide information products and services based on public sector documents, to enhance an effective cross-border use of public sector documents by private companies for added value information products and services and to limit distortions of competition on the Community market.
6. One could consider ease of redress to be the fifth determining factor, representing the hassle (time, money) the re-user has to go through to effectuate its rights. However, where redress is a truly national and widely diverging element that is not specific for reuse, but is applied to legal proceedings in any area of law, it has been left out of the equation.
7. Obviously, this is not a mathematical formula. Lawyers better stay away from those! Nor will the result actually be a concrete figure. It merely indicates the interconnection of the factors and their interconnected impact on Utility of PSI, thus leaving untouched issues such as whether the variables are discrete or dichotomous.
8. In some countries efforts hereon have been undertaken: more than 10 years ago the Constitutional Committee Franken on fundamental rights in the digital era suggested to incorporate a provision hereon in the Dutch Constitution, obliging the government to cater for accessibility of its PSI. Unfortunately, this suggestion, including the rest of the recommendations died a more or less mort sans phrases.
9. This has been enhanced by recent developments, where existing re-users have attacked PSBs planning to allow re-use at marginal costs. See for instance: http://www.epsiplatform.eu/news/news/re-use-is-forbidden, describing the - successful! - efforts of a Dutch re-user of geographic information to prevent a Dutch PSB providing those data to adopt a marginal costs regime.
10. These are merely examples from some Member States and do not imply that such organisations are re-use unfriendly across the board.
11. http://www.aporta.es/web/guest/index.
12. Quite impressively, the PSI data sets available in data.gov.uk/are now well over the 4600 mark (not including those that will come in via the UK INSPIRE portal and that will be embedded in data.gov.uk). So far, after one year (October 2009 -November 2010), over 100 new applications have been made by people like you and me (meaning two per week!). The applications range from Mouseprice (providing free access to Land Registry price paid data matched up to estate agency data (property for sale), Google street views and satellite imagery) to Fillthathole (providing a single site for reporting potholes and other road hazards across the UK). Obviously, these are just these free applications. The actual number is likely to be significantly higher.
13. See the case study Data.gov by Lakhani, K.R., Austin, R.D., and Yi, Y., (2010) which presents the logic and execution underlying the launch of US Data.gov and demonstrates the benefits of making government data available in terms of both engaged citizens and potential new innovations from the private sector, http://hbr.org/product/data-gov/an/610075-PDF-ENG?referral=00304.
14. Most striking was the fight the Ordnance Survey (OS) put up against the UK re-user Intelligent Addressing (IA). This courageous company, after five years of unsuccessful negotiations with the OS, decided to let the UK re-use regulator (OPSI) decide on the matter. However, where OPSI upheld most of IAs claims, on appeal, it was knocked on the head by a decision from the Advisory Panel on Public Sector Information (APPSI), which rendered a fundamentally different and antithetical decision - considered as a wrong decision by many. Interestingly, it has been assessed that till date the OS has spent over GB £300,000 on legal support from its (publicly funded) resources. See also: Cross, M., in the Guardian, 3 May 2007, Intelligent Addressing ruling provokes public spat - two bodies responsible for public sector information go head-to-head http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2007/may/03/freeourdata. guardianweeklytechnologysection.
15. Quite supportive to this striving is the notion that statutory registers such as the Cadastre were established to ensure legal certainty and stability to the property market, not to make money. The latter was the result of budgeting decisions. Therefore, in principle, the oft-heard argument that exploitation is part of the public task, since it is laid down in the statutory regimes of the Cadastre, does not make sense.
16. Joined cases C-241/91 P and C-242/91P Radio. Telefis Eireann (RTE) and Independent. Television Publications Ltd (ITP) v Commission of the European Communities [1995] ECR I-00743.
17. Last year the Dutch Council of State failed to seize a rather unique opportunity to submit a number of fundamental questions to the European Court of Justice in the case between the municipality of Amsterdam and Landmark (see: http://www.epsiplatform.eu/news/news/a-landmark-decision-in-the-landmark-case and (in Dutch) http://www.bastiaanvanloenen.nl/pubs/BVL-NJB-2009-landmark- herzien.pdf).
18. Brussels, 7.5.2009 COM (2009) 212 final http://eur-lex.europa.eu/ LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=COM:2009:0212:FIN:EN:PDF.
19. Living up to this commitment, the Commission recently launched studies in 9 Member States on the existence of exclusive arrangements. Except for Germany all results have been published (http://ec.europa.eu/information-society/policy/ psi/facilitating-reuse/exlusive-agreements/index-en.htm), identifying a number of potential exclusive arrangements and collaterally a large number of potential Article 10 PSI Directive infringements that would merit further investigation.
20. See: http://www.lapsi-project.eu/frontpage.