We are pleased to announce the date for Open Data Day(s) 2023. Open Data Day (ODD) is an annual celebration of open data all over the world, where groups and communities gather to reach out to new people and build new solutions using open data. Each year, groups from around the world create local events on the day where they use open data in their communities. It is an opportunity to show the benefits of open data and encourage the adoption of open data policies by government, business, and civil society.

As a way to increase the representation of different cultures around the world, in this edition, we offer the opportunity for organisations to host the ODD event on the best date for their location between March 4th and 10th 2023.

ODD is a bottom-up initiative and Open Knowledge Foundation (OKFN) has facilitated and helped organise it for the last 7 years. Check out the open data day activities from 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022.

Please visit the ODD website for more information and register your event if you have already started planning for it: https://opendataday.org/

2023 Thematic Focus

For 2023, to achieve a greater impact from the events, ODD will focus on a single theme and concentrate mini/small grants around it.

“Open Data to AI” will be the thematic focus for ODD 2023. With this theme, we aim to seek how open data is playing a critical role in the field of artificial intelligence, machine learning and other emerging technologies.

• What does the path from Open Data to AI look like? 
• How has AI been used or can be used to tackle world-pressing issues? 
• How can open data and AI illustrate the urgency in various subcategories like climate change, budget transparency, ownership, mapping, and many more?

Organisers are free to host events according to their own thematic interests and priorities. But to achieve the impact, the small grants will be concentrated only on a single theme.

Website Translation

As the 2023 content of the ODD website is updated, we are looking for contributors who can help us with the translations. The ODD website has been previously translated into 14 different languages.

To translate the site we need to duplicate the contents.lr file, and save it with the language code in the file name, like contents+de.lr.

Check out the old translation here and README.md for more information. Feel free to contact us if you need any support.

ODD Small Grants Program

Each year, OKFN partners with funders to support Open Data Day events around the world with small grants. Small grants are funds that individuals or organisations can use to cover the expenses of organising the event.

Until today we have partnered with 16 different organisations to deliver small grants to support beneficiaries hosting open data events and activities across the world. We are extremely grateful to all our partners – past and present.

For 2023, the value of the small grants will be 500 dollars for each selected event. There are four distinct partnership opportunities and they are all modular and can be delivered individually or in any combination. For more information related to the Open Data Day and Partnership Opportunities, please contact: Nikesh Balami (nikesh.balami@okfn.org), International Open Data Lead, and Carol Matos (carolina.matos@okfn.org), Partnerships Lead.

You can check out the 14 organizations awarded with small grants last year, spanning initiatives based in Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Ecuador, India, Indonesia, Liberia, Madagascar, Nigeria, Sweden and Tanzania.

You can also reach out to the Open Knowledge Foundation team by emailing opendataday@okfn.org and can join the Open Data Day Google Group to get connected with others.