We want information...

The way I see it there isn't enough information available to make informed choices.

I know that Scott Adams frequently says that he doesn't have enough information to make the choice of who to vote for, but that is more of a comment about modern politics that anything else. What I'm talking about is the idea that people do not share information enough. There ought to be an independent body for gathering information and publishing the analysed and grouped data.

The most obvious occurrence of not having enough information is related to our household recycling. We recycle as much as possible, both because we both believe that it's much better for the environment, but also because we hoard stuff and are loath to throw anything into the earth (i.e. Landfill). The main issue I have is whether to wash off the labels from tin cans etc before putting the metal into the local recycling depot's bins. Ignoring the fact that I drive a car to the depot (but I do save everything up into a big trip every couple of months) is it worth the energy expended by heating hot water and washing off the labels or would it be better overall to leave the labels on and let them be washed off in bulk?

Of course, I could try to find this out for myself, however I suspect that the exact recycling procedure is closed information and would take me a long time to calculate whether it's better to do this myself or not.

What we need is a body to gather all this kind of information and then trawl through it and publish the results. Under this scheme there would be a legal requirement on companies and individuals to provide information when asked, but also to publish their processing details, company procedures etc (there would be safeguards for company information and only general information need be supplied at first).

I suppose people might think it a bit Orwellian to have such an organisation, but with proper controls it could only be used for good.

I think this needs further investigation… who's with me?