By Drew Bush AquaHacking will bring together water stakeholders and technology enthusiasts (and hackers) to solve freshwater issues including those related to climate change. The weeks-long hackathon will culminate in a two-day summit in Montreal, QC on October 6 & 7, 2016. The organizers of the event believe it’s a great opportunity for developers and water researchers alike to come together … Read More
Twitter Chat: Civic Participation on the Geoweb
All cylinders were firing by the time we wrapped up our Nov. 23 Twitter chat on meaningful civic participation on the geoweb. There were many parallel conversations that we hope will continue among participants and the wider Geothink community into the future. Here we share a few highlights, as well as a transcript of the chat. We should ask what criteria define “civic … Read More
Spotlight on Recent Publications: Open Data and Official Language Regimes
By Naomi Bloch Teresa Scassa is a Geothink co-applicant researcher and Canada Research Chair in Information Law at the University of Ottawa. In a recently published paper, Scassa and co-author Niki Singh consider some of the challenges that arise for open data initiatives operating in multilingual regions. The authors use Canada’s federal open data initiative as a case study to … Read More
RECODE Open Data Youth Leader – My View on A Week of Open Data Events
By Suthee Sangiambut This article contains personal reflections from Geothink’s Newsletter Editor and Student Coordinator, Suthee Sangiambut. This year’s Canada Open Data Summit and International Open Data Conference confirmed that open data and open government are quickly becoming mainstream topics for all sorts of disciplines and subject areas. I consider myself part of the open data community, due to my masters … Read More
CODE Hackathon Set to Kick-Off as New Report finds the World's Governments Slow to Open Governmental Data
By Drew Bush In the first weeks of the New Year, two important news items for the Geothink audience made headlines. In Toronto, the Canadian federal government got ready to kick-off its second annual multi-city Canadian Open Data Experience (CODE) while the World Wide Web Foundation ranked the United States 2nd and Canada 7th for openness of governmental data in … Read More
Civic Hackathons: Innovation, Procurement, or Civic Engagement?
By Peter Johnson I’ve recently published a jointly-authored viewpoint piece with Dr. Pamela Robinson from Ryerson University in Review of Policy Research. Titled ‘Civic Hackathons: Innovation, Procurement, or Civic Engagement?‘, we take a critical look at the recent phenomenon of civic hackathons – time limited contests typically run by governments designed to promote use of open data resources, and potentially solve … Read More