Community Health Data Initiative.

I’m a big fan of open source and am excited about its implementation outside of its traditional bounds. One example of this has been an increasing movement on the part of the United States government to open source its data. Traditionally, much of this data has been open but not available. Now the U.S. government is providing the data in an easily accessible format that can be chewed upon by individuals and organizations.

Alex Howard has an excellent article over at O’Reilly on the Community Health Data Initiative including some of the applications that have resulted from the availability of this data. Howard notes that it has been ten years since GPS data was open sourced – and everyone can see the tremendous ways in which that has boistered business (creating new industries) and innovation.