Open data is a valuable resource that can be freely accessed, used, and shared by anyone.
In Australia, initiatives like Data.gov.au and Open Data Australia provide extensive datasets that support innovation, research, and decision-making across various sectors.
Benefits of Open Data:
Innovation and Research: Open data fuels new discoveries and technological advancements by providing researchers and developers with the raw materials they need to create innovative solutions
Transparency and Accountability: Government and public sector data made available to the public enhances transparency and allows citizens to hold institutions accountable
Economic Growth: Businesses can leverage open data to identify market trends, improve services, and create new products, driving economic growth
Consult Colleagues or Collaborators: Leverage the knowledge and experience of your peers.
Journal Supplements and Article Links: Look for supplementary materials or links provided in journal articles.
Data Journals: Explore journals dedicated to publishing datasets.
Data Registries: Use registries that catalogue and provide access to datasets.
Open Data Portals: Access publicly available data through open data platforms.
Institutional Repositories: Check Research Online, ECU institutional repository or repositories from other institutions.
Discipline-Specific Repositories: Find repositories tailored to specific fields of study.
Project Websites: Visit websites of research projects for data and software resources.
Data Discovery Aggregators: Utilise aggregators like Research Data Australia to search across multiple sources.
Library Catalogues and Databases: Search library catalogue and specialised databases for relevant data and software.
When reusing data, it is important to recognise that it may have been collected for different purposes than your own. Aggregating such data can sometimes lead to unintended consequences, such as identifying individuals or exposing sensitive information.
Here are some key questions to help you understand the data and potential issues:
Documentation and Metadata: Is there sufficient documentation and metadata to assess the data's usability? Consider why the data was collected, by whom, and when.
Funding Sources: Who funded the data collection? Be mindful of potential biases and agendas.
Collection Methods: Does the data include details about how it was collected? Evaluate whether the methods used are appropriate for your research.
Ethical Considerations: Were the original data collectors ethical in their approach? Did participants provide informed consent for data sharing?
Potential Biases: Identify any biases that might affect your research, such as region, internet access, age, or gender.
Licensing and Usage: What does the licensing allow? Determine the formats you can use to manipulate and reproduce the data, and whether commercial or for-profit use is permitted.
When searching for data, it is helpful to understand the difference between portals and directories.
When reusing open data, it is crucial to acknowledge the contributions of the original researchers who collected and curated the data. This recognition not only respects their hard work but also promotes ethical data sharing practices.
Citations: Always cite the original data source in your publications, presentations, and any other outputs. This gives credit to the researchers and allows others to trace the data back to its origin.
Licensing: Check the data's licensing terms to understand how to properly attribute the original creators. Many open datasets come with specific attribution requirements.
Acknowledgements: Include acknowledgements in your work to highlight the contributions of the original data collectors. This can be done in the acknowledgements section of a paper or a dedicated section in your project documentation.
Transparency: Be transparent about the data's origins and any modifications you have made. This helps maintain the integrity of the data and ensures that subsequent users are aware of its provenance.
Ethical Practices: Adhering to ethical guidelines is essential. Ensure that the data was collected and shared ethically, respecting the rights and privacy of individuals involved. Follow any ethical standards or codes of conduct relevant to your field.
Find out more:
Making Data Count: Bringing Citations and Usage Metrics Together
Data Citation and Linking
Key Directories, Portals and Repositories:
AURIN- Australia’s spatial intelligence network: AURIN is crucial infrastructure for researchers, government and industry, accelerating research into our towns, cities and communities. We provide the data and tools to allow you to make evidence-based decisions quickly and confidently, and we can help you get in touch with world leading urban experts right here in Australia.
DataCite: Facilitates finding, accessing, and reusing data.
Data One: A community driven project providing access to data across multiple member repositories, supporting enhanced search and discovery of Earth and environmental data. DataONE promotes best practices in data management through responsive educational resources and material.
Data.gov.au: An easy way to find, explore, and reuse Australia's public data.
Data Portals: A comprehensive list of open data portals from around the world.
DRYAD: A nonprofit repository for data underlying the international scientific and medical literature.
FAIRsharing: A curated resource on data and metadata standards, linked to databases and data policies.
Global Biodiversity Information Facility: An international network and research infrastructure funded by the world’s governments and aimed at providing anyone, anywhere, open access to data about all types of life on Earth.
IEEE DataPort™: An easily accessible data platform that enables users to store, search, access and manage datasets up to 2TB across a broad scope of topics. The IEEE platform also facilitates analysis of datasets and retains referenceable data for reproducible research.
Mendeley Data: A secure cloud-based repository for storing, sharing, accessing, and citing data.
PLOS ONE list of recomended repositories: A set of established repositories which are recognised and trusted within their respective communities.
Research Data Australia: Provides access to data from over a hundred Australian research organizations, government agencies, and cultural institutions.
re3data.org: Simplifies data sharing with the Repository Finder to locate the right repository for your data.
VertNet: A NSF-funded collaborative project that makes biodiversity data free and available on the web. VertNet is a tool designed to help people discover, capture, and publish biodiversity data.
Zenodo: Welcomes all research outputs from all fields, including sciences and humanities.