

[UK] Post code data to be free in 2010 - davecardwell
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8402327.stm

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nailer
At FOWA a few months ago, the Ordanance Survey (a taxpayer funded organization
that handles postcode and general surveying in the UK) had a stand asking
people to pay the typical exhorbitant amount of money (a few hundred pounds a
year) to access the data their taxes already paid for.

Pretty much everyone at the conference doing anything in the geo space was
using the 100MB file that gets uploaded to wikileaks every few weeks instead.

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rlpb
Taxpayers don't pay directly for the Ordnance Survey.

"It is a separate government department that is now financed through data
licensing rather than direct funding from the tax payer"

[http://www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/oswebsite/media/features/tra...](http://www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/oswebsite/media/features/tradingfund.html)

Having said that, public sector organisations licence data like everyone else,
and that money does come from the taxpayer. However, if the Ordnance Survey
were a private company then this situation would be the same.

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robin_reala
This is great news! You could ask ”What’s taken so long?” but that would be
sour grapes. Guess we no longer need <http://freethepostcode.org/> now though.

~~~
ZeroGravitas
Let's not count our chickens before they hatch:

 _"Harry Metcalfe, who helped sites get at postcode data, said he was
"cautiously optimistic" about the decision to open up the OS data sets. "The
'how' is terribly important, quite easily the difference between a fantastic
data release and a waste of time," he said. He said it would "possibly" be
enough to help websites that want to use postcode data. "Maybe probably." he
said. "It will be if it's done right."_

~~~
ZeroGravitas
And it looks like the Post Office has already clarified that the PAF data (the
stuff that lets you go quickly from a postcode to a customer's address) will
remain closed:

[http://www.freeourdata.org.uk/blog/2009/12/postcodes-to-
be-f...](http://www.freeourdata.org.uk/blog/2009/12/postcodes-to-be-free-but-
which-ones/)

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EnderMB
I've always wondered how forms have managed to get my address through my post
code. It will be great to play with this data once it is available.

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bdfh42
news.ycombinator.com/item?id=981000

news.ycombinator.com/item?id=985599

