Members
OneGeology has received enthusiastic support from around the world and active membership continues to grow. The initiative is being carried out with the financial support of its Subscribing Members (Principal, Associate and Corporate) and with the endorsement of several International umbrella organisations, driven by the expertise, data and commitment of the geological surveys of the world.
Statement guiding prospective members
All participating members of OneGeology share the aspiration to improve the accessibility (including interoperability) and usefulness of global geoscience data needed to address many societal issues including mitigation of hazards, meeting resource requirements, and climate change.
In order that we can work collaboratively to advance the objectives of OneGeology and avoid any confusion or misunderstanding, we believe that it is important that we all embrace a common understanding or our role in OneGeology. The OneGeology initiative was launched March 2007 in Brighton, UK when 81 participants from 43 countries initially endorsed the Brighton Accord. The principles defined in the Accord remain the core of OneGeology and have been amended with additional rules set out at meetings in Paris in October 2013 and by the OneGeology board in 2017.
OneGeology participating members can be any organisation that agrees to the Brighton accord principles. In the case of geological surveys they commit to providing — via web services published by themselves or by agreement with an associated institution — authoritative digital datasets as geological ‘maps’ or other geoscience data coverage for their territory, and/or trans-national area. Before they make their data available, or have it made available by others, they must have notified the OneGeology Administration that they wish to participate in OneGeology. Other institutions or companies can become members without having their own geoscience data to serve but need to comply with the rules defined for their membership type.
By notifying OneGeology that they wish to participate in the initiative an organisation (being either geological survey, academic or governmental organization or a company) is indicating that they agree to make available data (or have it made available by others) to OneGeology and that they accept legal and scientific responsibility for the data that they serve (or others serve on their behalf) to the OneGeology portal and the World-Wide-Web generally. They are also indicating they either accept the OneGeology "statement of use", or a statement they supply with their data.
If an organisation makes a contribution to OneGeology through its web services, these services and their associated metadata will be identified in the OneGeology portal (portal.onegeology.org) registry of global geological and other geoscience coverage and use of their web services on publicly available websites is permitted. OneGeology requires that each organisation serving the data provides some form of attribution that allows acknowledgement of the source of the data and a reference for further information.
Conformity to these simple requirements will ensure that all OneGeology participants enjoy equal status within the OneGeology framework and will facilitate the continued growth of both the initiative and online global geoscience dataset coverage.