Boris Johnson has appointed a new Digital Advisory Board, to help the London Mayor’s various digital projects, including London Datastore, WIFI London, The London Card and the proposed single non-emergency number for London.
The Board, chaired by his Economic Advisor Anthony Browne, will include a number of social innovators who have already engaged and supported the work of the London Datastore.
The Datastore has for the first time put realms of previously unavailable data from the GLA, the functional bodies and London Boroughs online for everyone to see and use free of charge.
Anthony Browne, the Mayor’s Economic Advisor said: “We have begun the process off transforming the way in which information is shared between the government and the public and it has already paid huge dividends with some incredibly exciting new applications being developed at no cost to the public purse.
“The technical expertise of the Digital Advisory Board will be a huge asset in helping us build on the work we have done and to achieve a data movement in London that rivals that of any other big city in the world.”
The board is expected to support and advise on the Mayor’s digital projects including the London Datastore, WIFI London, The London Card and the proposed single non-emergency number for London.
Their role will also be to reflect the views of social innovators in London to the Mayor as well as advising on any relevant technical developments.
Members of the Board will include:
Professor Jonathan Raper -who has worked to bring the power of geospatial information to users for over 20 years. He is the author of a number of books including one on postcodes (commissioned by the Royal Mail) as well as a book on geographic information systems (commissioned by ESRI). Jonathan has worked with Ordnance Survey, the Environment Agency and Royal Mail as well as insurance companies, emergency services and utilities to develop geospatial infrastructures to deliver new products and services. He is Professor of Geographic Information Science at City University London and CEO of Placr Ltd., an SME adding value to open datasets.
Emma Mulqueeny -is a founding Director of Rewired State and is one of Britain’s leading digital communication strategists and communicators. She has spent much of the last decade successfully crafting transformational digital initiatives, at senior levels, across the British Government and in the States. She has consulted to the Cabinet Office, Foreign Office, Home Office, Department of Work and Pensions (DWP), Central Office of Information (COI) and Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs (HMRC), among others. Reinforcing this work is her track record as a serial entrepreneur described by Britain’s first Digital Minister, Tom Watson MP, as “simply extraordinary”.
Paul Clarke- has worked with many government departments and local authorities on technology and organisational strategy. In the last few years, he has specialised in digital strategy – from the relationship between individual and government, to issues of trust, identity and transparency. He is active in the initiatives to open up data for reuse, and in work to engage the public with Parliament. He relishes public service innovation, and his own contributions include one of the winning entries for the Cabinet Office “Show Us A Better Way” competition and the creation of a one-man social transport service for London during the 2009 tube strike: the “Tweetbike”.
Chris Thorpe– formerly a research scientist has been involved in projects as diverse as social worlds for 7 – 11 year olds, video archives of Nobel Prizewinners telling their life stories, a James Bond Premier Webcast and putting contemporary sculpture on Trafalgar Square’s Fourth Plinth. Chris was also responsible for the developer outreach programme for the Guardian’s Open Platform.
Mike Butcher -is the Editor of the influential tech blog TechCrunch Europe and is the cofounder of Tech-Hub London. TechHub is a new co-working space for technology people in London. A long time journalist he has written for UK national newspapers and magazines including The Financial Times, The Guardian, The Times, The Daily Telegraph and The New Statesman. In 2009 has was named by the Daily Telegraph as one of the top 50 most influential Britons in technology and in 2010 by Wired Magazine as one of Britain’s Top 100 digital power-brokers.
Toby Barnes – is the Managing Director of the Mudlark Production Company. He has a long history in digital media working in publishing and development for a number of key industry organisations such as Emap, Virgin, MTV Networks and Two Way TV Games. As well as launching Europe’s first commercial interactive TV service, he was responsible for the Bafta award winning content across mobile, broadband and narrowband channels for MTV Europe. As part of Mudlark, he is currently developing Chromaroma, a social game that gives you the power to play your mass transit system.
Chris Taggart -is the developer behind OpenlyLocal.com a project that opens up local government data and now has in-depth information on over 150 councils across the UK. He is also a member of the Government’s Local Public Data Panel, is a member of the Open Knowledge Foundation’s Open Government Working group and was the originator of the Open Election Data Project.
Christopher Osborne -is Business Development Director for ITO World providing transport intelligence for transport professionals and passengers. He is currently working on visualising the world’s transport data. A well known figure in the UK geoweb community he is an expert in geospatial technology and the potential for open data to improve public sector service provision
