ICTlogy

Keynotes on Accessibility and Reuse of public sector information.

Accessibility.
Fundación Sidar. Loic Martínez Normand. Presidente de la fundación

Accessibility: guaranteeing that the web is available for everyone independently of their capabilities. This definition has been broadened when more people are disabled in different ways (e.g. temporarily because of broken arm) and because of the proliferation of different displays with which one can access the world wide web. Functional diversity: sensory (sight, hearing, touch), motor (mobility, skills), cognitive (comprehension, language, learning).

Principles in accessible design: a website has to be perceptible, comprehensible, operable, robust. The new website scores average, but is much better than the previous one.

Reuse of public sector information.
Fundación Civio. Mar Cabra. Directora de la fundación.

Some experiences in transparency and reuse of public sector information: tuderechoasaber.es, dondevanmisimpuestos.es, espanaenllamas.es.

There is a lot of information that already exists, that has been paid by the taxpayers, and that is not used because it has not been made publicly available. There even is the possibility to make business/profit by reusing public sector information.

Make available:

• Legally, by making it freely (no copyright) available by law.
• Technically, so that computers can “read” the information (e.g. no scanned images, but text documents).
• Humanly, presenting information in visual ways that humans can better understand than long lists of rows in tables.

Availability is also about being able to provide feedback, and providing feedback in a transparent way (e.g. no through forms).

Previous post: Open Parliament, the Senate in the Net (I): Transparency and communication

Next post: Open Parliament, the Senate in the Net (III): Citizen participation and presence of the Parliament in the Net