"Take Amartya Sen's flute example: there is a little kid who makes a flute and then there is another little kid who plays the flute and then there is a little kid who doesn’t have any other toy. Should this flute be given to the person who has made it, to the person who actually knows to play the flute, or to the person who doesn’t have any other toy?" This parable, brought up at MediaNama's two-day discussion on the Governance of Non-Personal Data, is a useful lens to look at the government requiring companies to sell non-personal data. Does the government have a legitimate public interest or sovereign claim over data it did not work to gather, and that it may not be in the best position to take advantage of? The discussion was held with support from Centre…
