SK53Nov 15, 2023

Talking of decade-long projects, freeing #PAF. the PostCode Address File must be well into it's second decade. Prompted by a recent update https://takes.jamesomalley.co.uk/p/i-had-a-meeting-with-the-shadow-business (and link to a 9 year old post by @Edent https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2014/11/why-do-we-continue-to-pay-for-open-location-data/)

My own posts from that period : http://sk53-osm.blogspot.com/2013/08/pfafing-about-opening-uk-address-data.html & http://sk53-osm.blogspot.com/2014/09/openstreetmap-at-uk-open-addresses.html.

Ludwig Siegele of @[email protected] did a great write-up too https://www.economist.com/international/2014/09/20/getting-on-the-map (paywall)

I had a meeting with the Shadow Business Secretary about the Postcode Address File (!)

Meme the change you want to see in the world

Odds and Ends of History
Show threadTom Loosemore
@SK53 @Edent Over 15 years, at least. Tom Watson manager to get the PAF very briefly freed up for the purposes of an open data competition in 2008... https://www.freeourdata.org.uk/blog/2008/07/want-the-postcode-address-file-for-free-just-ask-updated/
Free Our Data: the blog » Blog Archive » Want the Postcode Address File for free? Just ask (updated)

Nov 15, 2023 at 4:39pmElk
Show threadSK53Nov 15, 2023

@tomski @Edent

Free the Postcode was even earlier than that https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Free_The_Postcode (Steve Coast , IIRC, @richardf, inter alia) and a similar campaign & I think they were in touch with Charles Arthur.

Old posts by @zool on the OKFN blog cover the 'aughties too: https://blog.okfn.org/author/jwalsh/ particularly https://blog.okfn.org/2009/12/23/some-facts-about-uk-postcodes/.

Free The Postcode - OpenStreetMap Wiki

Show threadSK53Nov 15, 2023
@tomski @Edent @richardf @zool Also see slide 15 of a stack by @[email protected] http://hummedia.manchester.ac.uk/institutes/mui/spag/documents/Barr.pdf on the £10 million spent on addresses for #Census2011
Show threadRichard FairhurstDec 5, 2023
@SK53 @tomski @Edent @zool Free the Postcode was Steve and needed you to submit GPS coordinates (in the days before smartphones), so uptake was limited. A bunch of us came along a few months later with npemap.org.uk, which took our roughly rectified out-of-copyright OS maps, and invited you to plot your postcode on them. It succeeded massively thanks to publicity in the Guardian, the Register, and geek sites like NTK.
Show threadSK53Dec 5, 2023

@richardf @tomski @Edent @zool

My bad, I was probably really remembering npemap.org.uk in that case (certainly the only one I contributed to) & didn't realise how many of the usual suspects were involved!