Data.gov.uk - Inspired

Of recent months I have been watching data.gov.uk develop and have been asking myself how we might utilise this great resource - this really is a fresh idea in the UK: making public data more easily accessible. This isn't like the one-stop shop of old where you still had to visit many shops, this is more like the hypermarket where everything is under one roof.

The concept is great: bring together all public data held by government, government agencies and alike and develop thoughts and ideas of how best to use this data.

With a slant towards anything with a geographical element in it, I set about searching for something that would catch my interest. The more I searched the more I realised how much this could really utilise a spatial data infrastructure like INSPIRE - It already has the some of the key elements like tags, so why not bring anything with a geographical element held in data.gov.uk in to line?

I would also really like to be able to search for data on data.gov.uk based on its geographical location rather than having to trawl through data simply based on tags. This could be based on a similar model to that marketed by WeoGeo. Like a kid in toy shop, I want to be able to add all the data I discover into a shopping basket and head for the checkout with a big grin on my face.