Comments for The Ernest Marples Blog

Comment on Postcode Petition Response — Our Reply by Number 10’s e-petitions can be better - Harry Metcalfe

Number 10’s e-petitions can be better - Harry Metcalfe — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 13:54:02 +0000

[...] still stuck in the mud? Why do we get responses to petitions that range from the dishonest to the obtuse, and only the occasional gem, when it really should be the other way [...]

Comment on Postcode Petition Response — Our Reply by stan

stan — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 07:03:24 +0000

@ Anthony Cartmell ” They manage it OK in the USA, so why can’t we do it here? ”

This could be why the USPS is on the verge of collapse and are working on a day to day basis to survive……

Comment on Postcode Petition Response — Our Reply by Mark Goodge

Mark Goodge — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 18:54:31 +0000

The government’s response is, frankly, pathetic. By going off on a tangent about the PAF they;re missing the point of what we’re really asking for here: Postcode geolocation data (eg, Postzon). So I’ve submitted a separate petition to try to get them to address that point specifically.

http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/geopostcode/

Comment on Postcode Petition Response — Our Reply by The Ernest Marples Blog › Respond to the Ordnance Survey postcode consultation

Tue, 26 Jan 2010 19:02:23 +0000

[...] Number 10 don’t seem to have noticed, but we have — and it’s so important that every right-thinking person in the land responds. We’ve got to tell the Ordnance Survey what we think — if we don’t, only incumbent commercial interests will respond. And if that happens, you can bet that whatever we end up with will be very similar to the status quo. [...]

Comment on Ernest Marples Postcodes has been threatened by the Royal Mail by Freeing public data « UKauthorITy.com blog

Freeing public data « UKauthorITy.com blog — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 16:13:09 +0000

[...] petition was started after Royal Mail sent a “cease and desist” letter to Ernest Marples Ltd, the organisation providing a post code API allowing social projects to use post code [...]

Comment on Postcode Petition Response — Our Reply by Anthony Cartmell

Anthony Cartmell — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 16:39:33 +0000

Most people don’t even want PAF access!! PostZon, or similar, on the other hand would be extremely valuable for all sorts of location-based things: postcodes have become the standard way to describe where you live, but few websites can legally make use of this.

A simple Postcode to Lat&Lng (or even OS grid reference, licences permitting) table could be generated with a simple query on the PAF database, costing almost nothing. Continue to charge people for using PAF, where that level of detail is needed (usually commercial operations), but provide postcode location data for everyone else to use.

They manage it OK in the USA, so why can’t we do it here?

Comment on Postcode Petition Response — Our Reply by Harry

Harry — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 12:22:24 +0000

@stan:

Of course. Government should pay for the data to be maintained for the benefit of the country at large.

This would cost about £20m a year — not much in governmental terms.

Comment on Postcode Petition Response — Our Reply by stan

stan — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 08:52:21 +0000

do you not know how much it costs to keep the PAF file up to date? Royal Mail’s not a charity you know…..

Comment on Postcode Petition Response — Our Reply by uberVU - social comments

uberVU - social comments — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 18:41:13 +0000

Social comments and analytics for this post…

This post was mentioned on Twitter by harrym: Our response to Number 10’s statement on postcodes: http://bit.ly/8DtlOZ #ernestmarples #omg #totalfail #grr…

Comment on Postcode Petition Response — Our Reply by Duncan Sample

Duncan Sample — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 17:19:23 +0000

I thought you didn’t actually use the PAF, you used a community created dataset like Geonames? Surely that wouldn’t be covered, like the comment “It would of course be very time-consuming and costly for anyone to try to replicate the list”, well, it’s been done pretty much, and then we get told we’re not allowed to create such a list because postcodes are copyright in themselves.