Core data stores in a University context

I've just come across what I think is a really interesting post about core data stores in a University context:

http://alexbilbie.blogs.lincoln.ac.uk/2010/02/04/core-dot-lincoln/

I haven't thought this through fully, but on first glance it seems to me that much of what's identified as needed at Lincoln would be directly relavent in Cambridge. The idea that University systems should be making interfaces to raw data available, for use by other University systems and potentially by others, has been bubbling around in the back of my mind for a while (and is something that I know is already happening in systems such as dSpace and the Streaming Media Service) and this post seems to be helping to crystalise some of those thoughts. Perhaps I'll come back to this topic in a later post.