For our previous open datasets of the week, FutureGov has selected data released on national government portals. But we don’t want to ignore the wealth of data available from state and city governments.
This week’s open dataset comes from Melbourne in Australia. The city has released data from its parking sensors across the central business district dating back to 2009. It is comprehensive, accurate and enormously useful.
Weiterlesen: AU: Open Dataset of the Week: Melbourne Parking Sensor Data
The terms of the deals were not disclosed, but the purchase is another example of Telstra's move to broaden its scope outside its traditional telecommunications businesses.
Local council leaders said their remote communities would find it hard to survive unless there was Federal Government support for significant upgrades.
Weiterlesen: AU: Poor telecommunications infrastructure 'leaving outback Queensland shires behind'
The regime will require them to store for two years customer internet and phone "metadata" for law-enforcement and intelligence agency access.
On Christmas Eve, telco industry body the Communications Alliance sent its members – including Telstra, Optus and Vodafone – an email requesting they fill out a survey with a deadline of January 9 on how much it will cost them to implement the scheme, giving them only nine business days to respond.
Weiterlesen: Australian telcos in race against time to estimate metadata retention costs
Despite the enthusiasm for squeezing ever more functions into a few giant government departments, there is little agreement that doing so actually works out better. Former New South Wales cabinet secretary Gary Sturgess even thinks so-called super-departments may degrade the quality of governance, saying it’s “entirely dubious” that the ever-larger departments are more efficient.
Weiterlesen: AU: Super-departments: efficiencies gained, policy lost?