Standing up an open data catalog can be a difficult and time consuming process for already overburdened government employees. However, a recent example from Brazil demonstrates how opening up the process to citizen participation can make deployment more efficient and cost-effective, while also increasing transparency and civic engagement.
When the Brazilian government launched Dados.gov.br (the first open federal government data portal in South America) in early May of 2012, it did so in collaboration with tech-savvy, civic-minded residents who helped plan and deploy the tool. A team of three federal employees from the Ministry of Planning, Budget and Management headed up the project, but citizens from the civic hacking community contributed time and skills to the entire development process. Powered by free, open-source data portal software CKAN from the Open Knowledge Foundation, Dados.gov.br was stood up with about a month of active development.
We sat down with Rufus Pollock, founder of the the Open Knowledge Foundation, who explained that CKAN has been deployed in more than 40 locations around the world. In the past, for reasonably sized deployments, the Open Knowledge Foundation had provided extensive support and resources to facilitate the process. But with improvements to the tool in the last year, governments and organizations are now able to autonomously deploy CKAN and easily build their own open data portal -- as exemplified in Brazil.
The fact that this software is free, available to any organization that wants to use it, and feasible to deploy autonomously makes it possible for even resource-constrained governments and agencies to stand up their own open data catalog. And by enlisting the help of citizens, governments can even further distribute the effort while also creating opportunities to strengthen community ties.
Citizens significantly contributed to the development of Dados.br.gov, in areas including planning, software development, design, and information architecture. Planning meetings were announced on public discussion lists, open to anyone who wanted to join, and frequently streamed live online for those unable to attend in person. At each meeting, the group proposed and prioritized ideas of what was needed for development. All events of planning meetings were captured in a publicly accessible wiki and a public online task manager.
“This synergy between government and citizens working together for the common good is what we mean by open government,” said Pollock in a blog post announcing the launch of Dados.br.gov. With this form of open government, the role of the citizen shifts from consumer of government services to an active collaborator, working with government to solve problems and generate real results.
As of the launch, the Brazilian open data catalog included 78 data sets with 849 resources. The Open Knowledge Foundation and the City Council of São Paulo are sponsoring the first-ever Brazilian hackathon, inviting citizens to build civic apps using the newly-available data. Winners of the apps challenge will be announced on June 4, 2012, and all resulting apps will be freely available for anyone to use. Through the collaborative launch of Dados.gov.br, citizens are becoming empowered to improve government -- and in the process, building a community of civic problem-solvers in Brazil.
Other governments -- national or regional -- that want to make their data open and available can find out more about how they can use CKAN here.
Featured photo courtesy of Flickr user Luiz Henrique Assuncao.
When the Brazilian government launched Dados.gov.br (the first open federal government data portal in South America) in early May of 2012, it did so in collaboration with tech-savvy, civic-minded residents who helped plan and deploy the tool. A team of three federal employees from the Ministry of Planning, Budget and Management headed up the project, but citizens from the civic hacking community contributed time and skills to the entire development process. Powered by free, open-source data portal software CKAN from the Open Knowledge Foundation, Dados.gov.br was stood up with about a month of active development.
We sat down with Rufus Pollock, founder of the the Open Knowledge Foundation, who explained that CKAN has been deployed in more than 40 locations around the world. In the past, for reasonably sized deployments, the Open Knowledge Foundation had provided extensive support and resources to facilitate the process. But with improvements to the tool in the last year, governments and organizations are now able to autonomously deploy CKAN and easily build their own open data portal -- as exemplified in Brazil.
The fact that this software is free, available to any organization that wants to use it, and feasible to deploy autonomously makes it possible for even resource-constrained governments and agencies to stand up their own open data catalog. And by enlisting the help of citizens, governments can even further distribute the effort while also creating opportunities to strengthen community ties.
Citizens significantly contributed to the development of Dados.br.gov, in areas including planning, software development, design, and information architecture. Planning meetings were announced on public discussion lists, open to anyone who wanted to join, and frequently streamed live online for those unable to attend in person. At each meeting, the group proposed and prioritized ideas of what was needed for development. All events of planning meetings were captured in a publicly accessible wiki and a public online task manager.
“This synergy between government and citizens working together for the common good is what we mean by open government,” said Pollock in a blog post announcing the launch of Dados.br.gov. With this form of open government, the role of the citizen shifts from consumer of government services to an active collaborator, working with government to solve problems and generate real results.
As of the launch, the Brazilian open data catalog included 78 data sets with 849 resources. The Open Knowledge Foundation and the City Council of São Paulo are sponsoring the first-ever Brazilian hackathon, inviting citizens to build civic apps using the newly-available data. Winners of the apps challenge will be announced on June 4, 2012, and all resulting apps will be freely available for anyone to use. Through the collaborative launch of Dados.gov.br, citizens are becoming empowered to improve government -- and in the process, building a community of civic problem-solvers in Brazil.
Other governments -- national or regional -- that want to make their data open and available can find out more about how they can use CKAN here.
Featured photo courtesy of Flickr user Luiz Henrique Assuncao.
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