Evento
In 2011 the project Sharing is caring was born in Denmark. An initiative to organize different national seminars that promote the openness of the information of the GLAM sector (galleries, libraries, archives and museums).
The first event took place in November 2011 bringing together a large number of participants from all over Denmark, from large and small institutions, museums, libraries, archives, educational institutions and members of the Wikipedia community. Such was the success of this initial call that Sharing's Caring also attracted assistants of other Nordic countries, working together in the development of a technological framework that allowed to share the digitized collections with the rest of the world, promoting the international cooperation for the development of the GLAM sector in the XXI century.
Desde entonces, Sharing’s Caring organiza cada dos años una conferencia donde se abordan diferentes aspectos relevantes en la apertura de los datos culturales que incluyen desde casos reales que muestran el impacto de la digitalización de contenidos hasta paneles específicos donde artistas, profesionales del sector y expertos en copyright debaten sobre arte contemporáneo, medios digitales y derecho de propiedad.
Since then, Sharing's Caring has organized a conference every two years where different aspects of the open cultural data are discussed, including real cases that show the impact of the content digitization and specific panels where artists, professionals and experts in Copyright discuss on contemporary art, digital media and property rights.
Digitization and social impact?
As digitalisation has become an important task for the cultural sector, more and more institutions are providing access to their collections in digital format. However, open data goes beyond the mere online access to information, it involves sharing the authority to interpret those assets and encourage their re-use.
In this context, the following questions arise: How can open data in the GLAM sector become a joint advantage for institutions, as well as for their public and society in general? What are the challenges faced by the movement in terms of copyright, institutional policies and social impact? These issues will be answered at the next two conferences that Sharing is Caring has organized this year.
For the first time in its history, the initiative crosses its borders in April 2017 to hold an extension of its national conference in the city of Hamburg. With the collaboration of the Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe and the University of Hamburg, from 20 to 21 April there will be different talks and workshops where participants will share their experiences and knowledge about open access to cultural content.
Moreover, the fifth edition of the Sharing is Caring seminar will be held in Aarhus (Denmark) in November, where, under the same motto as the German call, the role of the open cultural data in citizen participation and its impact on society will be discussed.
Would you like to assit? For more information on each event, visit the official Sharing's Caring website: http://sharecare.nu/
Entrevista
Interview with Josema Alonso, Open Data Program Director at the World Wide Web Foundation.
1. According to your experience with the open data program at the WWW Foundation, what are the greatest impacts of open data publication?
One of the greatest impacts of open data publication is the transparency and accountability of Public Administrations. Moreover, open data enable the creation of added value services by companies, which subsequently commercialize them.
Another important aspect that should be highlighted is the improvement of public services. The eGoverment has long arrived, enabling a number of changes and facilities in the relation between the citizens and the Administration. In this way, the open data help optimize those services, which to a great extent are new services provided by the Administration. For example, in the last years there are so easy apps that a citizen can report to a local administration on a bump in a road to make the Administration repair it in an effective way.
2. How were the beginnings of open data in Europe and what is the future of this sector?
In Europe the open data came introduced by the re-use of public sector information, though both concepts are not exactly the same, but we started to see the use by the industry and there was an important industrial base in the private sector. The transformation of the re-use of the PSI into open data has made the community that uses those data increase significantly.
In addition, there was a wave of campaigns, usually developed by the social society to promote government accountability, aimed at publishing data regardless of the format, where or how they were, with the only goal of “knowing”: learning about the information collected by the Administrations and subsequently checking if it was useful or not.
For a time, in my opinion, it worked. It had an effect on the public administration worldwide and data began to be published. The problem, about which I have been talking since a couple of years, is that we are focusing on the tool instead of the impact of this tool in society.
In the last two or three years, from the WWW Foundation we have insisted on the open data utility: we shall see problems in the world that can be solved through open data. Nowadays, this evolution is starting to have effect. I think that in the next years we will see a greater recognition by the citizens. Perhaps, they will ignore that open data are being used but they will see services and applications that re-use that information which, at the end, benefits them.
3. Which is the role played by the World Wide Web Foundation? What is the place of open data in those functions?
The Foundation was established by the Web creator, Tim Berners-Lee, with the goal of keeping the Web free and free-of-charge, maintaining the freedom of expression and any type of association, while care is taken to keep it decentralized, no monopolized or governed by any administration or government in the world.
The WWW Foundation works in three areas: access, digital rights and participation. In the first of them, we try that the web access is the most affordable as possible to make its cost no be over the 5% of the average monthly salary in the developing countries. Though we are a long way from achieving this goal.
As regards the Digital Rights, we work especially with the freedom of expression and individual privacy. Always taking into account the security that governments must have and carry out in any web activity. And, finally, in the Participation program, led by me, we work to give voice to citizens through open data.
We have been working together in these three areas in the last years, since the Foundation was created. Now we are seeing an increasing evolution in the intersection of the three pillar in which we work, for example, there is increasingly a talk of open data and privacy. In this way, we are seeing that this type of areas where our pillars join is where we will have to work more in the following years.
4. How has the Open Data Charter helped open data in the world?
The idea behind the Open Data Charter is pretty simple: harvesting the knowledge and best practices of those countries which are more advanced in open data and helping other nation develop properly their open data policies. In this way, administrations around the world were invited to make those best practices be applied globally.
Nowadays, we are creating implementation guidelines, both general and sectoral ones, to make the agencies implement more easily the Open Data Charter principles. At the moment, we are in the phase of the Charter adoption. Currently, thirty local and regional Administration throughout the world have signed the Charter, including the Spanish Government or the Madrid City Council. We expect that in the future the number of Charter members increases considerably.
There are already important success cases of both external and internal economic benefits for the administrations. There are many cases on the European Data Portal, for example, of efficiency in the administration that allow saving public money or of accountability of parliamentary activity.
5. How can open data help eradicate poverty and corruption in the world, two of the Sustainable Development Goals established by the UN?
Open data will not eradicate poverty, but they can contribute to its eradication in some way. How? The WWW Foundation has investigation cases in Africa where, for example, open data can help improve the water quality, detect the pollution or identify where breakdowns are to solve them as soon as possible.
In addition, this is the year of the fight against corruption and the countries commitment has been growing steadily. Finally, it has been understood that this is a black hole in the global economies, affecting the citizens.
Evento
From September 26th to October 5th the international workshop Visualizar'16 Open Cities will take place in the cultural space Medialab Prado (Madrid), an event dedicated to those cities in the world that are committed to openness of information, transparency and re-use of data to improve services provided for citizens.
On this occasion, two simultaneous calls are opened: one call for projects related to open cities and an application for collaborators. During the workshop a maximum of 8 proposals will be developed, selected among those submitted until August 14th and the final list will be published on August 25th. The project proposals may be submitted individually or collectively, but they must necessarily be open to other collaborators who can contribute to their development during the workshop.
Secondly, those interested in participating as collaborators may submit their request until next September 19th. The collaborators, led by the project leaders, will be part of the working groups, providing expertise and ideas in the development of the selected projects. As there will be no selection process, all applications will be accepted until full capacity. Moreover, working groups will be completely organized during the initial presentation of the projects.
Participants in the workshop may register through the online platform Community, an interactive network of Medialab Prado that allows collaborators to contact the project leaders and send questions, opinions or comments.
The projects developed during Visualizar'16 Open Cities will be presented at the Open Cities Summit, to be held in the same place in October 5th and included in the agenda of events before the International Open Data Conference. Once the summit is over, the work will be exposed in Medialab Prado until December 12th.
The aim of the Visualizar'16 workshop is to re-use the city open data in different fields such as environmental sustainability, infrastructure, citizenship or socio-cultural sector. The proposals may include visualization tools, mechanisms of participatory data collection, development of open hardware tools for information collection, open data initiatives ... or any idea to exploit the potential of this resource in urban environments.
During nine days, a solution prototype will be developed and tested through eight working groups that will be coordinated by each project leader. Projects will be developed with free software, open standards and under licenses that allow their re-use and redistribution.
This workshop is included within the Medialab Prado program, Visualizar, which organizes annual sessions on research processes related to theories, tools and data visualization strategies to improve their understanding and to use them for the general good.
Evento
Madrid City Council has announced the first edition of the Datathon and Data Journalism Awards, aimed at entrepreneurs, developers, designers, journalists and students interested in open data. The aim of this competition is to foster the re-use of public sector information, promote http://datos.madrid.es/ and convert it into, not only a point of access to local datasets, but into a tool to boost the development of innovative solutions based on open data.
The awards are divided into two different categories; firstly a Datathon where participants will develop an innovative solution based on the re-use of local datasets such as a computer applications a websites or a data visualizations.
Individually or in groups, projects must be submitted under the AGPLv3 license and, in the case they include data from other sources, the participant must be entitled to use them in accordance with the regulations.
In parallel, the Data Journalism Awards presents two different categories; one for professionals, where newspaper articles written from 2015 to date will be assessed. And secondly, a category for students to award the best texts published in any type of media, or piece of work belonging to their studies. In both cases, the content must be related to the activity of the Madrid City Council, re-using the local open data.
To be eligible, the applicant have to submit his proposal according to the application form available on Madrid website or electronically on the website created for the Datathon and Data Journalism Awards. The deadline is 6th August.
Evento
On the occasion of the International Open Data Conference and included on the agenda of events before IODC 2016, the Open Cities Summit will take place on 5th October at Media-Lab Prado in Madrid.
This meeting will bring together international open data practitioners in order to show how open data is being used around the world to improve the lives of citizens at the city level, facilitate knowledge exchange around open cities, and ideate solutions to overcome identified challenges in creating open cities as regards four areas: management of an open data policy, urban planning, environment and competitiveness.
The Open Cities Summit is aimed at civil servants, journalists, civil society organizations, researchers and any citizen who believes in the potential of open data to improve the environments in which they live. Thus, the event will consist of workshops, lectures and round tables, which will be structured in three parts. Firstly, the experts will share policies of their open data cities and show how their open data policies are helping improve the lives of citizens. Secondly, participants will be working in groups to ideate solutions to overcome the four different challenges mentioned above and finally, there will be open space to discuss the challenges and opportunities of creating an open city.
The organizing committee has opened a Call for Actions for open data practitioners who can submit initiatives in the field, especially those that offer an answer to the problems of urban development, environment, competitiveness and management of open data policies. The aim is capture a representative sample of best practices and to enrich the debate on the potential of open data for subnational governments. The deadline for the proposals is 15th August.
Entrevista
Interview with Antonio Moneo, senior associate in the area of open knowledge at the Inter-American Development Bank.
Which is the role of the IDB in the open data ecosystem in Latin America and the Caribbean?
The Inter-American Development Bank is a multilateral organization that provides support to countries to finance major reforms of the administration and infrastructure. Through several departments, especially through the Division of Institutional Capacity of the State, the Bank has accompanied many countries in Latin America and the Caribbean in the development of open government policies, training programs for civil servants, technological infrastructures for publishing open data and many activities to generate international and local commitment.
The IDB has always opened spaces and channels to share their knowledge with countries. In recent years it has significantly increased the scope of these efforts by creating a digital library of technical publications, a blog network, the open data portal "Números para el Desarrollo", offering massive online open courses (IDBx), and a working line to open knowledge where we include progressively open innovation methodologies that the Bank uses to articulate open ecosystems. Moreover, we are planning to continue expanding the number, quality and type of open knowledge products. Stay tuned to the following updates.
Which are the main objectives of your blog "Open to the public"? How does your blog contribute and help the open knowledge sector and community?
The blog was launched in 2014 as a space to learn about the evolution of open knowledge in Latin America and the Caribbean, which has been a pioneer at different times and in different cases. Open government policies as in the case of the city of Buenos Aires, or the Government of Chile, made us think of the potential of open knowledge to foster innovation in the public sector.
This approach has always led us to pay attention to the spillover effects of opening up knowledge, which often goes unnoticed. We saw that opening up knowledge helps governments be more transparent, but above all establish channels to improve the design of public policies. Thus, when we open up the knowledge we contribute to the dual goal of making administration more transparent and accelerate economic development in the region.
I think the biggest contribution of the blog has been serving as a repository of real examples, recommendations and methodologies on how open knowledge promotes the country development in Latin America and the Caribbean. Our articles have let many people know specific examples which show that open knowledge is truly useful. To date, we have published more than 200 articles, many of them from external partners, and we have a community of 16,000 subscribers. We receive an average of thirty thousand visitors per month from all countries worldwide. We have almost a million visits in total.
“Opening up knowledge helps governments be more transparent, but above all establish channels to improve the design of public policies”.
You are a member of the Open Data Charter, which role does the Open Data Charter play? Which will be the next steps of this global initiative?
The Open Data Charter is an universal declaration aimed at standardizing the open data definition. Though its non-binding nature, it enjoys sufficient legitimacy to generate a shift globally. It is an essential tool to establish the framework for public discussion on open data, and it will be critical for governments and cities which are approving plans within the framework of the Alliance for Open Government. For me, it would be ideal that the countries in the region commit themselves to adopt and implement the Charter within its Action Plans in the Alliance for Open Government.
The Open Data Charter has been promoted by an international and interdisciplinary group now divided into five working groups. These working groups strive to collect examples of how open data are being used in cities and private sector; to develop tools for specific sectors or issues specially important such as the fight against corruption; to generate theoretical frameworks for analyzing the impact of open data and tools to facilitate the implementation of the Charter.
Since the IDB has organized several data hackathons, which barriers are found organizing such events?
Identifying the expectations is always a key issue. It is essential that the hackathon is seen as a milestone in an open innovation process, and not as a single event. At each hackathon we work for months to select challenges, create institutional partnerships, open databases and train those who will participate in the event. If the hackathon is assessed by the number of viable projects obtained, it is difficult to obtain good results, and indicators which are more important are also lost.
If expectations are well identified, obstacles can be reduced to mere milestones of a project. If the challenges are significant, it will not be difficult to find allies. If allies are strong, it will not be difficult to open up data. And if you know what your participants need, it will not be difficult to train them. It is a question of good expectations.
In your opinion, at what point of maturity is the open data sector and the re-use of public sector information in Latin America and the Caribbean?
Latin America and the Caribbean are experiencing a very interesting time. Fifteen countries in Latin America and the Caribbean are attached to the Alliance for Open Government, and eleven of them were evaluated by the last Open Data Barometer. The trend is unequal and I think the conversation is more focused on the debate on the access to information, which is the basis to talk about re-use. There is much to do.
However, in regional forums such as the Regional Conference on Open Data, the Latin American Open Data Initiative or the regional summit of the Alliance for Open Government Partnership we see how the discussion about standards occupies growing space. For me, this is a sign that we are moving gradually towards a model of re-use of data. It is good news and I would like to see a law enacted on the re-use of data in the future.
“The trend is unequal and I think the conversation is more focused on the debate on the access to information, which is the basis to talk about re-use.”
What do you believe the main barriers are for open publication in Latin America and the Caribbean unlike other regions of the world?
The lack of regional integration is the main barrier. Latin America and the Caribbean need to institutionalize the regional debate on access and re-use of information. It is difficult to obtain sustainable results if there are no standards to standardize and link openness processes. In that sense, I think the debate on transparency should be extended to include the issue of technical interoperability. It is important that the information is public but also re-used, and, for that to happen, it is essential to publish it in a standardized way.
Nevertheless, the solution requires a greater effort to train civil servants. It is not just a technical problem. In fact, there are standards, but they are not properly implemented. It is necessary to train civil servants to understand how open data can help improve public policies. When the head of a department in a ministry understands the potential of the data, it is easier to address the issue of interoperability.
”The lack of regional integration is the main barrier. Latin America and the Caribbean need to institutionalize the regional debate on access and re-use of information.”
As a specialist consultant on open knowledge, what do you think the main differences are between Latin America and Spain as regards the focus on open data policies?
In the regulatory matter we can say that the European Union is a privileged environment which has facilitated many discussions. Directive 2003/98/EC on re-use of public sector information was the basis for further regulations on interoperability and the European statistical system upon which EUROSTAT relies. Spain adopted this directive in 2007 and, since then, it has been able to frontally address the problem of interoperability.
In Latin America and the Caribbean I see a high participation of civil society what I would like to see replicated in Europe. There is good coordination between organizations in different countries, and together they have played a very important role in the legislative development of open data. I find very interesting the emergence of government laboratories where is institutionalizing the relationship between government and civil society is being institutionalized in the field of re-use of data to improve public policy.
Evento
“Crowd-sourcing questions that if answered could radically increase our understanding of open data”
On October 5th, international researchers will gather at the second Open Data Research Symposium (ODRS); a pre-event to the International Open Data Conference to be held in Madrid. As in the previous edition, ODRS 16 will offer attendees the opportunity to reflect critically on the results of their investigations while cohesion is sought within the research community about the potential impacts of open data.
Though the ODRS call for proposals ended last May, the deadline has been extended to all members of the open data movement to help shape the program of the event, focusing on the most relevant aspects in the field. To do this, the organization has created a specific section on the Symposium website where users can submit questions for researchers to resolve their doubts about open data. Moreover, it is also possible to send the questions via Twitter using the hashtag #ODSR16. The deadline is July 1st.
Thanks to user’s questions, it will be possible to identify the topics of interest to the international open data community, draft the ODRS program to ensure sessions are tailored to the needs of the participants, build a collaborative agenda and report efforts and collaborations that take place during the meeting.
More information about the pre-events to the annual open data meeting? Stay tuned to the website of the International Open Data Conference. See you in Madrid!
Evento
On 29th-30th June the European Data Forum will take place in the Dutch city of Eindhoven. Under the slogan "Scaling up the Data Economy in Europe", this event will bring together professionals, researchers, legislators and members of several initiatives to discuss about the challenges and opportunities arising from the data in the EU. Thus, during these two days, this forum will address all facets of data-driven innovators: big data, from infrastructure, tools, applications (including new products and multilingual services for different European audiences) as well as societal and economic impact.
This event is relevant for all stakeholders involved in the data value chain, they will be shown the cutting-edge innovative industrial applications of big data technologies to upcoming innovation breakthroughs. This forum is designed as a meeting point where participants will have the opportunity to exchange experiences and ideas, which will be used to find solutions to current challenges and to design EU policies in order to strengthen the European data economy while it becomes a global leader in this area.
The European Data Forum will consist of more than forty talks, an exhibition and the presentation of a set of posters selected by the organizing committee which belong to one of the following categories:
1. Posters with a practical, industry- or user-oriented focus by representatives of technology providers and organizations. Innovative data applications in different sectors of the European Economy: agro food, automotive, education and skills, healthcare, media, policy, smart industry, urban smart living, and others.
2. Posters with a technical focus reporting concrete experiences by representatives of academia and research centres. This category includes new data models and languages, optimized architectures, content analytics, data mining, predictive analytics, predictive models, semantic technologies, geospatial data techniques and systems for contextualization and personalization.
3. Posters with a specific focus on impact-creation activities including policy development, road-mapping, standardisation, exploitation and training, data-driven business models, data governance and open data.
The forum is expected to overcome the success recorded in the last edition, held in 2014, where more than 600 people from more than 360 organizations attended the event in Greece. The participants had the opportunity to attend for two days three panels related to NeSSI, big data, collaboration and interoperability; in addition, there were thirty talks organized in different networking sessions devoted to the following topics: open data, best practices, Horizon 2020 working program and data usage.
Thanks to the European Commission support and the large number of technological initiatives of big data, open data and linked data; data economy includes a large number of European stakeholders, interested in adding value to the information. In this context, the European Forum has established itself as an excellent opportunity to join synergies at European level to advance and achieve common solutions and strategies that position the EU as a leader in global data economy.
Evento
Next 15th the event eventotransparente.org will take place in Madrid, a day in which best practices, open government policies and models in Spain will be analyzed. Driven by the Oesía Group and collaborating in the Gobiernotransparente.com and Docxpresso organization, the meeting consists of four panels, through which participants will have the opportunity to learn the experience of experts, public and private entities on open data initiatives, open government, legislation transparency and citizen participation at national level.
The aim of this meeting is sharing common knowledge to improve institutions and companies while participants discuss innovation and transparency as a tool to improve the efficiency and control of public administrations and the need to involve citizens in public processes.
This free event will take place in the cultural space MediaLab Prado and due to capacity limitations, those interested in attending the conference need to register through an online form; if the registrations exceed the number of vacancies, preference will be given to attendees belonging to public administration and civil society.
Entrevista
Interview with Fernanda Peset, professor of the Universidad Politécnica de Valencia, Department of Communication Studies, Documentation and History of Art.
Analyze the current situation of open publication of scientific results in Spain. In comparison to other countries, what point has been reached?
In the case of scientific results, two major groups have to be distinguished: publications and data. This was already pointed out in 2012, when the European Commission implemented a survey on digital preservation, which, in the case of publications, had advanced enormously and, in the case of the data underlying the research, was just beginning.
Which are the main obstacles that hinder the opening of data by the scientific community?
In the survey carried out during the project DATASEA, researchers suggest that the reasons of concern are: the misuse or interpretation and legal questions about confidentiality and intellectual property rights. Some also said they were losing time making them available or they feared that others take the lead in research thanks to their data. In general, we try to squeeze the samples as much as possible, but critics are also feared.
What measures are considered necessary to promote and boost the culture of open data in the research field?
Undoubtedly, recognition of the release of scientific results is essential to generalize it. Parameters of the assessment of a scientific are very clear in calls for career advancement and in the organizations themselves. Under pressure, researchers choose to monetize their work, which means spend as much time as possible for publications in refereed journals or obtaining patents. This would be the way of incentives, but also the obligations undertaken to obtain financing or publish in a particular journal can be decisive to invest the necessary time to open them up. Ideally, both routes are combined, which always require data literacy and support of organizations, something that is now beginning in Spain.
Under pressure, researchers choose to monetize their work, which means spend as much time as possible for publications in refereed journals or obtaining patents.
Under the framework of Horizon2020 program, a pilot project was launched in 2013 to improve and maximize the reuse of research data. Which are the conclusions three years later?
We are not aware that the European Commission has published evidences in this field. However, it could be said that the pilot plan has encouraged researchers, being or not part of it, to view their research from this perspective. Although it is not compulsory, including in the Impact section how they will get, manage and release the data, always contributes to a better evaluation of their proposals.
Moreover, both research management offices and information services are preparing for a demand for advice on it. For example, the translation of requirements H2020 in the DMP (Data management plan) tool, called PAGODA, by Madroño consortium has been a strategic positioning.
Finally, the draft of the open science agenda provides explicitly for the development of an open data policy, and for this purpose a panel of experts is being formed.
What is the OAI, Open Archive Initiative, and which are the main features of its protocol OAI-PMH?
At the philosophical level, it is the first big step to break with traditional forms of access to science. The increase in journal prices in the 80s was getting worse the gap among countries and organizations of first and second order. Thereafter, the green and gold ways to open access -listings and magazines, respectively- make up what we are currently living. The orders derived from Open Access movement have been essential in the opening up of scientific information. However, from my point of view, the model has been distorted, as it is shown by the high cost invested to pay the golden via. The research funding is being earmarked in part to the publication, and, therefore, sometimes to support the publishing industry. But it is not possible to adopt extreme positions, without this industry we would not have the services that we currently have access...
As regards the main features of the protocol I think its design and ease of implementation have been the determining factors for its success. Dividing the provision of information on data providers and service providers which can reap the metadata of the first revolutionized the scene and saved costs worldwide.
The orders derived from Open Access movement have been essential in the opening up of scientific information.
What would it be necessary to make the scientific and research community value the role of open data and its reuse?
After having experienced personally the open access movement since its inception, I think some issues will happen again. In fact some statements about open access already included data. And from that experience it is worth stressing the need of apostolate of the different agents involved: the scientific sector itself, from the academic and political authorities and support services. The support is essential to reach a successful end and, in this regard, the education –data literacy- will be increasingly necessary.