This guest post was submitted by Bob Kerr of Openstreetmap.org. Openstreetmap.org has just had its 8th Birthday. For those new to the name, Openstreetmap is the wikipedia of maps or rather a single map, the map of our world. Initially born because the cost of licensing Ordnance Survey data was £5000 for a single use, […]
A Special Gift for Festival Participants… For the 600+ brave souls already registered for the world’s first-ever Open Knowledge Festival, here’s our first-ever participant bulletin! The gems and secrets below have been built from the weekly-curated, community-written summaries we’ve been sharing behind the scenes with our teams of Guest Programme Planners around the globe – and with less than two weeks left until […]
On August 24-25, another edition of OpenDataMx took place: a 36-hour public data hackathon for the development of creative technological solutions to questions raised by the civil society. This time the event was hosted by the University of Communication in Mexico City. The popularity of the event has grown: a total of 63 participants including […]
This is post 4 of 5 in the Open Data India series, following Lucy and Laura’s visit to India to learn about the challenges and opportunities for open data. Read previous posts from Bangalore, Chennai and Mumbai. Our final stop in India was Delhi. Several people had told us that Delhi was the ‘policy capital’ […]
This is post 3 of 5 of the Open Data India series, following Lucy and Laura’s visit to learn about the challenges and opportunities for open data. Read previous posts from Bangalore and Chennai on the main blog. After joining forces with the DataMeet group in Bangalore and Transparent Chennai’s open data workshop, we were […]
This is part 2 of 5 of the Open Data India Series. You can read the first post ‘Open Data – Bangalore’ on the OKFN blog. Chennai, formerly Madras, is only a short train ride away from Bangalore. Laura and I hadn’t been intending on travelling to Chennai on this trip, but a mail from […]
Laura and Lucy from the OKFN team recently travelled to India to learn where the challenges and opportunities for open data in India lay. This is part 1 of 5 of the Open Data India Series. The Bangalore data scene is huge. A bustling IT and data mining industry means that you are never far […]
With only 4 weeks left until the OKFestival week starts in Helsinki, here is our latest rundown of everything you need to know about the event. We’re very excited about what’s in store for participants this year! OVERVIEW New to OKFestival? We are delighted to invite you to this year’s event in Helsinki, Finland – […]
As the comedians, acrobats and miscellaneous thespians prepare to leave the Edinburgh Festival Fringe for another year, it’s time for the open data crew to reclaim the city! Following on from the two successful meet-ups which took place in March and May this year, #OpenDataEDB will be returning for its third event of 2012. For […]
Following Edinburgh-based Meet-ups earlier this year, a small group of people interested in promoting openness recently met together to link-up ideas and projects, and explore possible areas of collaboration. The attendees were: Ewan Klein, University of Edinburgh Sally Kerr, City of Edinburgh Council Sam Leon, Open Knowledge Foundation Naomi Lillie, Open Knowledge Foundation Jilly Mathews, […]
As the 2012 Open Knowledge Festival‘s organising team released Early Bird Tickets a few weeks ago from sunny Finland, we witnessed something exciting. The many experimental threads that have, until now, existed only as a complex web of planning based on two public Calls for Proposals (and a great deal of Skype meetings!) have starting […]
Thessaloniki is a vibrant, sun-drenched beachfront city in Northern Greece. It is famous for its impressive historical lineage, its frappé coffee culture and its diverse population augmented by academics and students from the largest university in the Balkans. A few weeks ago, I learned something else unexpected: the city is also a veritable mecca for […]
For those looking for yet another reason to join us for OKFestival in Helsinki this September, the OKFestival Core Organising Team is proud to announce the inspiring public outcomes of our unconventional First Call for Proposals – and to request your participation for our Second Call to share your ideas in Finland. As we’ve noted […]
Following the fun we had at March’s Meet-up ‘launch’, we will be having another gathering of people interested in open data next Wednesday 16th May. Hosted by the Wash Bar, Edinburgh, from 19.00, come and join us to discuss ideas, projects and plans in relation to openness. Lightning Talks will include Federico Sangati on crowdsourcing […]
We are excited to announce a number of events in Berlin in the next two weeks! Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-S0627-0300 / CC-BY-SA During the re:publica (Germanys biggest Internet-related conference, which is increasingly international) we will host three little Meetups. From May 2nd to 4th we will be waiting for you at the Wikimedia Tent at 6:15 […]
A more detailed version of this post can be found on the Finnish Institute blog. The Finnish Institute in London has recently completed a five-month research project on the British open data policies. The report looks at how the open data ecosystem has emerged in the UK and what lessons can be drawn from the […]
Following on from our Open GLAM workshop in London, in a few weeks we’re hosting a half day workshop in Berlin looking at how to overcome barriers to opening up data in the cultural heritage sector entitled Rechtliche Fragen beim Öffnen von (Meta-) Daten Gedächtnisinstitutionen (Legal Questions Regarding (Meta)data in Cultural Heritage Institutions). We […]
For those looking for a reason to come to Helsinki with us this fall, the OKFestival Call for Proposals is released today – and it has an experimental, innovative focus. The spin? For this year’s OKFestival (the first event of its kind, organised almost entirely through virtual conference calls, IRC chats and co-written documents by […]
I am in Vienna, along with my colleague Ira, for a plenary meeting of the assorted partners of the LOD2 project. LOD2 is an EU-funded research project on Linked Open Data, the vision of an interlinked web of data known to many from Tim Berners-Lee’s TED talk. The meeting runs for 3 days, in which […]
Open data in Austria enjoys support from various levels of the public administration, and as a result Austria is one step ahead of the Czech Republic. Last month, we held a seminar to learn from each other’s experiences. Austrian initiatives promoting greater openness of government data, such as the Open Knowledge Forum Österreich, have managed […]
Last night was the first OKFN Meet-Up in Scotland* at the Ghillie Dhu, Edinburgh, run in collaboration with DevCSI. 19 people attended from around the city and nearby, including Glasgow, and those visiting for the Open Biblio Sprint represented Cambridge, London, Wolverhampton and the Netherlands. The Auditorium was a beautiful venue, and there was a […]
Austria is one of our incubating OKFN:LOCAL chapters in its last stage before full incorporation. Its core group of organisers in Vienna are planning an OGD BusinessDay2012 on March 22nd in Vienna and the OGD2012 Conference on June 26th in Linz, Austria. For updates and more information, go to http://gov.opendata.at/okfo/index.html. The OKFO – the Open […]
Greece is our first Open Knowledge Foundation Local group in the Mediterranean, and just had their first meetup in Thessaloniki with regular public meetups and events to follow, including a public meetup with staff from the OKFN, Wikimedia, Creative Commons and other organisations on April 5th at the Aristoteleian University of Thessaloniki. For updates and […]
Switzerland is one of our incubating OKFN:LOCAL chapters in its last stage before full incorporation. Its core group of organisers, a talented collaboration from Geneva and Zürich who also founded http://OpenData.CH, are planning an Open Data Conference in Zürich on June 28th. Here’s a hello from Hannes Gassert and Andreas Amsler regarding the state of […]
Helsingin Sanomat, Finland’s leading national paper, is organizing an article app contest to find data visualizations. For many journalists today, it’s not a lack of open data that’s the problem, but a lack of the skills and off-the-shelf visualizations needed to make that open data useful to them. A year ago, the Finnish government decided […]
The following post is by Kat Braybrooke, London-based Community Coordinator of the Open Knowledge Foundation (Regional Chapters and Groups) and a core organiser of OKFest. On September 17-22 this year, global communities will be descending on the shores of Helsinki for a week-long celebration called the Open Knowledge Festival – and you’re the first to […]
Editor’s Note: This blog post comes from Michaela Rybičková, one of the organisers of the OKFN’s newest regional group in the Czech Republic, #OpenDataCZ. You can find more information about our local groups and chapters here. Our first Prague open data meetup was held on the 14th of December in the Kulový blesk restaurant. Despite […]
Note: This post is by Jindřich Mynarz, one of the talented organisers of the OKFN’s newest Local Chapter in the Czech Republic. In Prague? Come to the Chapter’s first meetup next week. The year 2011 has seen a sustained growth of interest in open data and open knowledge in the Czech Republic. There’s been a […]
The following post is by Kat Braybrooke, one of OKFN’s London-based Community Coordinators and the contact point for incubating Local OKFN Chapters around the world. Fresh from days (and late nights) full of discussing open web communities in Barcelona at the Free Culture Forum, exchanging code and starting sites about information freedom with hackers in […]
The Open Knowledge Foundation today proudly announces the launch of the Apps 4 Germany Contest. The Contest is organised by three civil society organisations (The Open Data Network, the Gov2.0 Network and the German Chapter of the OKFN) in cooperation with BITKOM (Federal Association for Information Technology, Telecommunications and New Media) under the auspices of […]
The following guest post is by Thomas Gegenhuber, Naumi Haque and Stefan Pawel, who are involved in Open Commons Linz. In 2010, the City of Linz, Austria completed a year-long study of an “Open Commons Region” for government. The findings of the study introduce a framework for open government, with the goal of creating a […]
The following post is by Christian Kreutz, co-founder and board member of the Open Knowledge Foundation Germany. Help us find innovative solutions for aid transparency and make development aid more effective. Germany is one of the largest donors in development aid worldwide. Every year over 6 billion euros are spent by the Federal Ministry for […]
The following post is by Theodora Middleton, the OKF blog editor. Fantastic news from our fledgling Austrian chapter, the Open Knowledge Forum Österreich! The cities of Vienna, Linz, Salzburg, and Graz, together with the Chancellor’s office, have established the “Cooperation OGD Austria” – a new alliance bringing together federal, state, and city governments, as well […]
The following post is from Friedrich Lindenberg and Stefan Wehrmeyer from OKF Deutschland. Today the Open Knowledge Foundation Deutschland is launching a new Freedom of Information (FOI) portal called “Frag den Staat”. The new site enables citizens, journalists and researchers to request information from over 830 federal agencies and institutions across Germany. Requests can be […]
The following is a post by Daniel Dietrich, coordinator of the working group Open Government Data and chairman of the German Chapter of the OKFN. We are delighted to announce the launch of “Apps für Deutschland” – the first open data competition in Germany. Apps für Deutschland (Apps4De) will officially be launched on November, 8th […]
The following guest post is from Martin Kaltenböck and Thomas Thurner from the Semantic Web Company, members of our brand new Austrian chapter, Open Knowledge Forum Österreich! The OGD2011 – the first Open Government Data Conference in Austria -took place on 16 of June 2011 in Vienna and was great success! The fully booked conference […]
Want to share your tales of openness with the world? Got a cool project you’d like to tell people about? Or perhaps some interesting ruminations about open knowledge? The OKF blog is a fantastic place to tell your story, open up conversations, and make sure all your hard work is getting noticed. We want to […]
The following is a guest post from Jindrich Mynarz at the National Technical Library in Prague, Czech Republic, member of the OpenData.cz initiative, and one of the organizers of the Big Clean in Prague. The Open Knowledge Foundation has just launched the okfn-cz mailing list: http://lists.okfn.org/mailman/listinfo/okfn-cz The short URL is: http://bit.ly/okfn-cz The intent of the […]
The following post is from Guo Xu, a member of the new OKF Working Group on Economics and a member of the YourTopia.net A few months back, we launched a simple app that allows anyone to say what kind of world, what “YourTopia”, they would like to live in. Created with the help of the […]
A brief reminder that this Saturday 4th December is the international open data hackathon! What is it? As says the blurb: It’s a gathering of citizens in cities around the world to write applications using open public data to show support for and encourage the adoption open data policies by the world’s local, regional and […]
This is a post by Rufus Pollock, co-Founder of the Open Knowledge Foundation and a member of the Board. The “Elektrischer Reporter” team in cooperation with the second channel of German television (ZDF) have just released a great video about Open Data. I’m interviewed in it along with Daniel Dietrich (OKFN Germany and Open Data […]
We’re delighted to announce that our friends at the Open Data Network and OKF Deutschland last week released some work that they have been doing to collate and visualise information related to public spending in Germany: Infosthetics broke the news: Offener Haushalt [offenerhaushalt.de] (German for ‘open budget’) is another demonstration of the large potential behind […]
The following guest post is from Holger Drewes, who is a member of Open Knowledge Foundation Germany and the Open Data Network in Berlin. As interfaces for open datasets from political and societal institutions become more and more available, the possibilities for easy and uncomplicated data visualization are expanding in very promising ways. With a […]
After having a good look at Inspace set up for a talk session, decided to up the maximum capacity, so there’s no longer a waiting list for OKScotland. If you’re planning to attend on Thursday afternoon then please do register now. Here’s the draft OKScotland schedule for the afternoon – note that there is coffee […]
We are delighted to announce the launch of the Open Knowledge Foundation Germany, which took place yesterday at the Leipzig Semantic Web Day. The OKF Germany chapter will be dedicated to promoting all forms of open knowledge in Germany — including open government data, open data in science, and the public domain. Work is already […]
Open Knowledge Scotland “brings together interested parties from across the open knowledge spectrum based in Scottish educational institutions, Scottish research organisations, Scottish local and national government, and members of the public for the purposes of teaching, learning and discussion”. OKCon in London is now in its fifth year. It seemed like time to put together […]
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.