The Open Definition 2.1 covers the “bulk issue” in section 1.2 Access, “The work must be provided as a whole…”.
So, my interpretation of this is, if you provide openly licensed data only via an API, it is not open data.
(I agree @emmaAkin, this doesn’t help convince providers to publish only via an API but hopefully the data is valuable without having an open data tag.)
As @rufuspollock mentions above… [quote=“rufuspollock, post:2, topic:294”]
bulk is essential: i may be able to get real-time twitter feeds by an API but I can’t get the data in bulk and that’s what I’d need to have real freedom with that data.
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Researchers I’ve spoken with also place high value on bulk data. They need it placed near their computing resources to perform complex analysis of the data and how it has changed over time.
@jaakkokorhonen it’s great that Helsinki provided one month of GTFS-RT data in bulk (and I do empathise with their capacity constraints).
Lastly, thanks for your work on defining an Open API - one that is openly defined, assessable, testable but doesn’t necessarily provide open data (e.g. your My Data example). I wonder what we should call an Open API that provides Open Data? 