virtualandy
commented
11 years ago Here's some other options...(was in an email, figured I'd put it here too)
I asked a question about real time sources on quora and got a few responses: http://www.quora.com/Where-can-I-find-public-or-free-real-time-or-streaming-data-sources
Here's the answers if you can't view it (sometimes you need a login) http://data.gov.uk/dataset/metoffice_uklocs3hr_fc - weather data from the UK updated every 3 hrs Meetup has an API where you can get near real-time RSVPs - http://meetup.github.io/stream/rsvpTicker/ is an example (that one might be good b/c it lists the city of the meetup and we could do a geo-lookup) More at http://www.meetup.com/meetup_api/docs/stream/2/rsvps/#websockets
Someone else asked about flight data: http://www.quora.com/Where-can-I-get-free-real-time-flight-tracking-data-via-an-api And they got a couple answers - http://flightaware.com/live and https://developer.flightstats.com/api-docs/how_to (which looks like they only have pay-to-use data)
Maybe a good thing to try would be an API-aggregator like mashery They have a number of APIs, some of which have location data. For example, they provide the api for active.com (list of local outdoor/sportsy events like 5Ks and marathons) and maybe that gets updated semi-frequently?
The UK Met Office provides publicly available meteorological data for free here: www.metoffice.gov.uk/datapoint
You need an API key, but it is zero cost. Data is served up in XML or JSON.
Found a neat 15-minute near-real time lightning tracker data point: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/datapoint/product/lightning-strike-map-layer