Francis Irving

This article is about the British computer programmer and activist. For the British glider pilot, see Frank Irving.
Francis Irving

Francis Irving
Education Oxford University
Occupation Chief Executive Officer

Francis Irving is a British computer programmer, activist for freedom of information and CEO of ScraperWiki.[1][2][3][4]

Francis Irving developed TortoiseCVS.[5]

He co-founded Public Whip with Julian Todd and became a developer of the affiliated TheyWorkForYou website,[6] a project which parses raw Hansard data to track how members vote in the UK Parliament. Initially risking prosecution for re-using the raw data which was under Crown copyright, the developers of Public Whip were later successful in getting permission to use it.[7] In 2004, Public Whip was recognised in the New Media awards.[8] In 2008, The Daily Telegraph rated TheyWorkforYou 41st in a list of the 101 most useful websites.[9] Irving together with Matthew Somerville wrote the code for FixMyStreet.[10]

Irving was also a senior developer of PledgeBank.[11] He collaborated again with Julian Todd to create 'The Straight Choice a website (later renamed 'Election Leaflets') that archives election leaflets.[12][13]

He was the Campaign Director of the Save Parliament campaign which opposed the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill.[14][15]

He was one of two people to suggest the winning idea of a site through which Freedom of Information Act requests could be made in a mySociety competition for ideas for public interest websites to build.[16] He was later to become the main developer of the site which was called WhatDoTheyKnow.[17] Francis has won seven New Statesman awards for websites he has worked on.[18]

References

  1. ↑ Francis Irving, Newswired.com
  2. ↑ Martin Rosenbaum (2010-06-09). "Open Secrets: Victory for whatdotheyknow website". BBC. Retrieved 2014-01-05.
  3. ↑ http://www.how-do.co.uk/north-west-media-news/north-west-publishing/scraperwiki-nets-$280,000-from-knight-foundation-2011062411352/
  4. ↑ Irving, Francis (2011-05-05). "ScraperWiki: A story about two boys, web scraping and a worm | ScraperWikiScraperWiki". Blog.scraperwiki.com. Retrieved 2014-01-05.
  5. ↑ "Companies". TortoiseCVS. Retrieved 2014-01-05.
  6. ↑ The Silent State, Heather Brooke p128
  7. ↑ Brook, Heather (8 June 2006). "Make it work for us, Ms Tullo". London: The Guardian.
  8. ↑ Archived May 7, 2010, at the Wayback Machine.
  9. ↑ Technology. "The 101 most useful websites". Telegraph.co.uk. Retrieved 2014-01-05.
  10. ↑ "Frequently Asked Questions". FixMyStreet. Retrieved 2014-01-05.
  11. ↑ Benjamin, Alison (10 January 2007). "Public inquiry". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 2 May 2010.
  12. ↑ Moore, Matthew (2009-05-15). "'British pensioners' on BNP election leaflet are actually Italian models". Telegraph.co.uk. Retrieved 2014-01-05.
  13. ↑ http://www.thestraightchoice.org/about.php
  14. ↑ "Write to your Lord to Save Parliament | Save Parliament Blog". Bill111.wordpress.com. Retrieved 2014-01-05.
  15. ↑ "Francis Irving's CV / Resume". Flourish.org. Retrieved 2014-01-05.
  16. ↑ "About". WhatDoTheyKnow. Retrieved 2014-01-05.
  17. ↑ "mySociety's Freedom of Information site goes live". Mysociety.org. Retrieved 2014-01-05.
  18. ↑ "news:rewired » Francis Irving". Newsrewired.com. Retrieved 2014-01-05.
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