Gregory's Server@mtmail @jonty Yeah, postal codes, particularly the fine-grained ones like ZIP+4 in USA, UK postal codes, Saudi short address, Israel's 7-digit, etc, etc, etc, are often bound up with intellectual property rights. (At least in England, Scotland & Wales there's CodePoint Open, sorry NI, SoL.)
Re EIRCODES, I'll just leave it to this thread from the Other Place. Check the replies, too.
https://twitter.com/PDverse/status/1280981313550454789?t=otmeGWv7uGypRpkk3ats3Q&s=19
@mtmail @jonty The key difference is that if the government pays to develop a fine-grained postal code system, albeit implemented by a privatised post office or, in the case of Ireland, by Capita, then there's usually some light at the end of the tunnel that the data might be made open on some way, medium term (cf. CodePoint Open). If you relinquish to W3W you are inextricably linked to a global-scale system run by a foreign company - until their patent runs out.