Ian
Site Administrator
Registered: 28th Aug 99
Location: Liverpool
User status: Offline
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Not sure if anyone is following but basically a web site called ernestmarples.com has been shut down after threats from Royal Mail.
This web site is run by two guys, Harry Metcalfe and Richard Pope. Its essentially a go-between for sites which commercially license PostZon data from Royal Mail and sites which want the information and don't want to pay for it.
They acquire it by scraping web sites who have it, and they provide it for free on their web site.
These guys are mounting a nationwide campaign and petitioning parliament, and mathematically, their results are no different to those using free low-res stuff which has been on the web for years.
The media are also complaining that there's a job web site which has been shut down so people can't search for jobs any more. Not clear why it needs to be so accurate. If I live in OX10 and there's a job in OX11, I'm probably going to go for it. I don't need the full codes and I certainly wouldn't worry about the additional couple of meters that a high resolution triangulation would offer if I needed a job.
[Edited on 30-07-2012 by Ian]
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AndyKent
Member
Registered: 3rd Sep 05
User status: Offline
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No idea what most of that stuff you said means, but to the last paragraph, I don't see the problem.
If the job site is so dependant on postcodes, they should be paying for the postcodes from the proper source rather than cribbing free data surely.
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ed
Member
Registered: 10th Sep 03
User status: Offline
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You can do low res postcode stuff using the Google Maps API. Sometimes it's annoying you can't get more accurate stuff from Google or anywhere else for free, but postcode data does belong to Royal Mail and a lot of the time you can get away with it.
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Doug
Member
Registered: 8th Oct 03
User status: Offline
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Harry Metcalfe is the guy from 'Evo' and 'Piston heads' isnt he?
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Sam
Moderator
Premium Member
Registered: 24th Dec 99
Location: West Midlands
User status: Offline
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@ Ian - not sure if you are aware of this:
Postcode data to be free in 2010
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John
Member
Registered: 30th Jun 03
User status: Offline
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Royal Mail should be doing anything they possibly can to make them more appealing to customers, they haven't got much time left.
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