David T. Bath

The utility of information is not determined merely by volume, but how readily relevant, and ONLY relevant information can be collected. This requires information to be properly categorized using metadata. While this metadata (including fine-grained keywords and security/confidentiality labels) is necessarily known by the authors of documents, it is rarely defined well in those documents, and therefore not readily discoverable. If government-produced documents, whether datasets developed by the ABS, or documents that analyse or propose policies, were properly labelled with subjects, fine-grained keywords, and labelled with confidentiality, it should be simple to put everything under a google-type search engine, and provide it without question unless confidentiality labels prevented such display. "If it isn't expressly prohibited, it is published". This would make it easy not only for the public service to find the relevant information required for efficient administration of a nation, but dramatically decrease the costs for most FOIs... for there will also be documents that may be identified to searches as relevant, but with titles only displayed, because the contents are hidden in accordance with security labels. A simple scan by an auditor or ombudsman could then produce a ratio of "secret" versus "public" documents by agency. We'd expect ASIO's documents to be mainly secret, but if a road planning or gambling control agency had as high a percentage of "secret" documents as ASIO, we'd know something suspicious was going on. I agree with those who argue that if government sponsors or part-sponsors the development of knowledge assets, then those assets should become common wealth unless there is a powerful argument on a case-by-case basis for publication. Many forget, however, that the same thinking means that government sponsored or subsidized research (e.g. in CSIRO or universities) should likewise be considered a good shared by the commons, even though these assets are commonly gifted to commercial entities who redefine those assets as proprietary.