[Phpwm] Re: Postcode Database (Chris Allen)

[Alex Mace]

Smacks of the Government's attitude to most public services - that they
should pay their way rather than providing a public service. Hence the
closing of rural post offices, restrictions on rural public transport, etc,
etc. All from a Labour government!

The main problem I see with it is the massive cost of getting access to it -
isn't that what a regulator is supposed to deal with? After all BT could
charge extortionate amounts for access to their network but they're not
allowed to by the regulator. Not that BT are a good example - they tried to
get royalties for people using hyperlinks when they once claimed they'd
invented them...

Alex

On 30/04/07, Phil Beynon <phil at infolinkelectronics.co.uk> wrote:
>
> > I don't understand why the government has to sell what should be in the
> > public domain for free.
> >
> > Here are some sites you may all want a quick look at:
> >
> > http://www.freeourdata.org.uk/blog/
> >
> > http://www.freethepostcode.org/
> >
> > http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/freegovdata/
> >
> > Keith Pope
>
> Probably for the same reason as you don't design sites for free, its
> called capitalism!
> They've got it, you haven't, so if you want it then you have to pay.
> At one stage BT actually tried to make telephone numbers copyrighted
> information, in that if you published your number or had it printed
> anywhere, like on business stationary, you should pay them royalties.
>
> I would imagine at some stage someone like Google will make it free by
> collecting enough data from people putting postcodes and locations into
> their mapping systems to effectively make it public domain information.
>
> Phil
>
>
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