Is Sunlight Labs shutdown the death knell for open government? | Hacker News Reader

Is Sunlight Labs shutdown the death knell for open government?

govpredict.com

16 pointsnnnnnn11 comments

Posting this for two reasons --

First of all, these organizations don't pop up or maintain themselves magically, it takes a leader to get this started and a smart team to keep it going. They deserve to be recognized for truly great work.

Second, I think having open government data in a truly ACCESSIBLE format is extremely important. If you've ever tried to look up data on the FEC site, you'll know what I mean. Not to take away from the FEC data site -- it's an incredible data resource, but tech companies certainly do a better job productizing these large amounts of data from the government.

Could someone turn this into a business? Then it would hopefully survive on its own.

Sharp thinking. Our business (GovPredict) is built around structuring fragmented government data. We've profited a great deal by it, and have some bandwidth and the inclination to now perform a public service and give the public access to a good deal of formerly unnavigable data.

Hey there. I'm Emil, the CEO of GovPredict. If you use Sunlight's repos, send me a note (emil@govpredict.com). I'd love to hear from you.

I used their openstates repo a while back and found it amazing how well they could distill the data. I had tried writing scrapers before for the same purposes, but it took forever just to get a fraction of what they had. Best of luck to sunlight devs in the transition.

Fascinating. I wonder how the future firms will leverage FOIA requests to continue building the database.

So do we. Until then, there is such an expanse of publicly available data that hasn't been touched: local ordinances, lobbying at the state level, campaign contributions at the state level, just to name a few.

Jesus, thanks for picking up the tab and maintaining it. surprised nobody is making a ruckus aobut it.

Thank you. Maintaining the whole project would be a herculean task, but we're happy to do our part.

Government data is so incredibly messy - good on you guys!

Thank you! Always great to hear from someone with the same outlook.

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