Very interesting to see Minister Tony Clement, President of the Treasury Board, today hosted the Government of Canada's first Google Hangout to talk about Government of Canada's Open Data initiative. Great to see the good old Government of Canada starting to use G+. Well, this event seemed to have come out of the blue and quietly finished before most Canadians got a chance to watch it live. Hopefully there will be more advance notice (a few days at least) to allow broader participation next time.
Here is the video Government of Canada - Innovating with Open Data
Here is an excerpt from the press release,
"Participants in the Hangout, which is a virtual, live-stream discussion, included Ray Sharma, Toronto mobile app developer; Edward Ocampo-Gooding, co-founder of Open Data Ottawa; Albert Lai, Toronto game developer; Kevin Merrit, a Seattle-based Open Data platform developer; and Ashley Casovan, Strategic Coordinator for Information Technology for the City of Edmonton.
"The opportunity for Canadian entrepreneurs to utilize Open Data to develop innovative applications has amazing potential," said Ray Sharma, President, mobile games developer XMG Studio Inc. "I see not only the opportunity for developers but there is a greater potential impact. And that is to the Canadian citizens who should be able to literally experience a benefit in economic productivity. We are just at the cusp of this emerging phenomenon, and participating in the Google Hangout was a great beginning."
The Hangout discussion explored some of the 273,000 datasets currently available on the Government's Open Data portal, as well as plans to launch an updated, next-generation portal later this year. Participants provided feedback on what data they would find useful, as well as what some of the key features of the new portal should be in order to encourage greater data uptake."
Special thanks +Google Canada for posting the video link so I can find it easily here.
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