I’m pleased to announce that the Knight Foundation is supporting a new project called the Civic Data Standards Study through their Prototype Fund.

The Civic Data Standards Study will investigate the successes and shortcomings of recent data standards efforts for government and civic projects to gain a better understanding of the dynamics involved and the factors responsible for success or failure. The study will profile several recent standards and the development processes used to create them.

The potential areas of focus include specific standards like the General Transit Feed Specification (GTFS) for public transit, the Open311 GeoReport API for providing feedback to government, the LIVES health inspection standard, and the Voting Information Project specification as well as standards frameworks and common schemas like the National Information Exchange Model (NIEM), Schema.org, and Data Catalog Vocabulary (DCAT).

Beyond these case studies, the study will also help catalog a broader range of existing standards, emerging efforts, and areas with a clear need or lack of standards. Ultimately, the study aims to develop recommendations for facilitating future standards efforts.

You can find more details about the Civic Data Standards Study on the Knight Foundation website.

Stay tuned here for more updates and be sure to follow @civicagency on Twitter.