Blog on Pro hitting 300,000 requests and noting design of service to prompt publication of previously private requests is working

[FOIMonkey]

A suggested by @garethrees at 100k, relevant for 200,000.

We should mark this milestone when it comes by blogging to highlight good use of the service.

[garethrees]

Or for another angle I've just noticed we've recently crossed 100,000 requests previously private are now public:

irb(main):017:0> was_embargoed_and_now_public
=> 102121
irb(main):018:0> was_embargoed_and_still_embargoed
=> 26668

Couple of key points off the top of my head…

• > 75% eventual publication is a very good thing
• case studies of use – some impactful journalism; I think there was a pro user asking about plastic document wallets so interesting commercial/climate angle
• We know there's a higher rate of non-classification, but I don't see that as a negative. Community helps the pro user (and other readers) through eventual classification.

[RichardTaylor]

75% eventual publication is a very good thing

Yes.

Many of the 25% of embargoed requests will still be within their initial, default, 3 month embargo period. That statistic would presumably be even more impressive/reassuring if requests made within the last 3 months were excluded.

I wonder if embargo extension is common or rare?

Community helps the pro user (and other readers) through eventual classification.

Theoretically "community", but in practice lots of the effort comes from a small number of people, many of whom are, or have been, WDTK volunteers. We know this kind of thing happens elsewhere eg. on Wikipedia but it's worth noting.

See also:

• https://github.com/mysociety/whatdotheyknow-private/issues/24

[FOIMonkey]

75% eventual publication is a very good thing

As Richard says, if the ones that are still embargoed are more recent, it could be that this would trend towards 100% if we were to turn new requests off for a bit.

In terms of commercial use, I've noticed this company use pro, (I'm guessing to gather the data for some of their products): https://neosypher.com/

[RichardTaylor]

We could mention things we're considering doing to encourage publication of even more Pro requests/responses:

• Make Pro requests public by default alaveteli#6567
• Suggest publishing when citation added to embargoed requests alaveteli#6051

[HelenWDTK]

Flagging this for me to look at, as we should hit the 200k mark very soon (IIRC was just over 196k last time I checked).

[HelenWDTK]

We've made it! I'll get on this.

[HelenWDTK]

The alternative is to hang fire until 250,000 - shouldn't take that long.

[JenMysoc]

Helen mentioned that we have hit this milestone for Pro now so it's worth investigating writing this post in the next cycle

[HelenWDTK]

I think we hit 300,000 this week...

[MyfanwyNixon]

This has been wrapped into the blog post drafted at https://docs.google.com/document/d/1DJoloEXQNC6vyGSagPK-6mlkb2HIJW2-wSDvu1W1x0s/edit#bookmark=id.7c4fzoyyzx75