A boost for transparency for Switzerland and the UN

From 16 to 18 September, Geneva will be the scene of an extraordinary encounter: the Open Knowledge Conference is turning the city of diplomats into the centre of the global Open Data movement and a meeting point for representatives of the United Nations and public administrations with technology activists, start-up entrepreneurs, designers and data journalists. Programmers meet diplomats; data experts and aid organisations jointly solve concrete problems on the spot thanks to data that are finally freely available.

In recent years, governments around the world have pushed ahead with transparency initiatives at great effort: from the White House to Downing Street, from Brazil to Bern. The vision is open knowledge – in the form of images and text, as data or information of any kind – knowledge that can be freely used, processed and distributed. Whether geodata or poems, municipal budgets or birth rates.

The Open Data movement has become a strong driving force for more transparency, accountability and innovation in the public sector and beyond. It is clear that “open”, much like “green”, is becoming one of the most important hallmarks of sustainable social and technological development.

Important steps for Switzerland and worldwide
For Switzerland, the Open Knowledge Conference, under the patronage of Federal Councillor Berset, means not only prestige as host country, but also concrete progress. High-ranking representatives of the federal administration are coming together in Geneva to move Open Data a decisive step forward in Switzerland too: at the conference, the Swiss Federal Archives, together with the Federal Office of Topography swisstopo, the Federal Office of Meteorology and Climatology MeteoSwiss, the Federal Statistical Office, the National Library and other partners, is launching the public data portal of the federal administration, the pilot platform opendata.admin.ch.

At the same time, Geneva is the first Swiss city to open a real-time interface for trams and buses, which is intended to pave the way for new “public transport 2.0” apps and more flexible use of public transport thanks to accurate, up-to-date data for all.

For the international community, the event, with over 600 decision-makers, developers and experts from all over the world, represents an important milestone: in Geneva, the idea of Open Data definitively goes global and is becoming the guiding idea of international initiatives. Participants from UNICEF, UNESCO or UNITAR, from CERN or the World Bank, for example, are discussing the paths and goals of their extensive Open Data activities.

Comments by Alain Berset, Hannes Gassert and Rufus Pollock
Federal Councillor Alain Berset welcomes the Open Knowledge movement to Switzerland (full text on admin.ch):

“The development towards an information society opens up undreamt-of possibilities for citizens. At the same time, it also means greater responsibility: the Open Government Data approach fruitfully combines the Enlightenment demand for intellectual maturity with the traditional task of the state to operate infrastructures for the benefit of all citizens – for the information society, this means a knowledge-based infrastructure. We are only at the beginning of this development, whose significance for our society can hardly be overestimated. Let us seize the opportunities for cooperation, such as those arising from the OGD@Bund pilot project, which is being launched at this conference.”

Hannes Gassert, co-founder of Opendata.ch, adds:

“Less than two years after our movement began, the Open Data idea is irrevocably taking root in Switzerland with this event: not only is our country hosting the world’s most important event in the field, we are also celebrating the launch of the very promising national data portal. The topic is thus establishing itself on the political agenda and will continue to keep us very busy: we are convinced that open data enables more transparency as well as more intensive public analysis, debate and visualisation, and thereby takes us forward as a society. Open Data will change our image of the state, foster openness and innovation in the public sector and give new impetus to our direct democracy.”

Rufus Pollock, founder of the Open Knowledge Foundation, adds:

“We are delighted to see how many countries have announced their support for Open Data, whether within the framework of the G8 , the Open Government Partnership or national and local initiatives. That decision-makers from all over the world are now coming together in Geneva is an important step towards a consensus for free access to knowledge, which must now become deeper and broader. The Open Knowledge Conference 2013 is a kind of ‘United Nations of Open’, and we will work to ensure that the United Nations takes a leading role for open data and genuine transparency worldwide.”

Keynote speakers

Ellen Miller co-founded the Sunlight Foundation which, politically and financially independent, works in Washington  to use technology to bring about more openness and transparency in government. More	Jay Naidoo heads the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition and thus fights against the hunger of two billion people. Among other things, Naidoo was previously Minister of Communications in the Mandela government. More	Benjamin Wiederkehr heads interactivethings.com, an internationally recognised data visualisation agency in Zurich. Villevivante.ch, their data analysis of movement in the city of Geneva, is now considered a classic. More
Andreas Kellerhals is Director of the Swiss Federal Archives, the lead organisation of the federal Open Data pilot portal being launched in Geneva. More	Jill Cousins, Director of the Europeana Foundation and head of Europeana.eu, will speak in the session “Building a Cultural Commons”. More	Chris Vein is Chief Innovation Officer at the World Bank, where he is responsible for pioneering Open Data initiatives in a large number of countries. More

See also http://okcon.org/main-speakers for further information on the keynote speakers.

Background

OKCon 2013 takes place from 16 to 18 September 2013 in Geneva at the international conference centre CICG  . The Opendata.ch association and the international Open Knowledge Foundation are organising the event in collaboration with the federal administration and the innovation conference Lift.

The full programme of the event can be found at http://okcon.org/schedule/ . In addition to the plenary sessions and a large number of workshops, developers, designers and lawyers will meet under the make.opendata.ch label for the first Swiss Law Mining Hackathon.

The Opendata.ch association is host of the Open Knowledge Conference 2013 and represents the global Open Knowledge Foundation in Switzerland. Since 2011, the organisation has been working for Open Data in Switzerland with massive voluntary commitment, exerting political influence and building up a nationwide community at great effort. The well-known and successful event series of make.opendata.ch Hackdays, for example, is known well beyond the national borders for productive collaboration between designers, developers and decision-makers.

Media contact

For further information and interview requests, please contact press@okcon.org or Hannes Gassert (board member of the organiser Opendata.ch, see quote above): hannes.gassert@opendata.ch.
For your accreditation see http://okcon.org/press.