Open Data China is one of our regional hubs for the pilot edition of the Global Data Barometer, in charge of the data gathering process in China. The organisation is based in Shanghai and was originally set up as an Open Knowledge Foundation local group which was later renamed to Open Data China. Since 2017 the team has been working as a formally incorporated social enterprise working to build an open digital future.
The team at Open Data China shared more about their projects including their work with Shanghai Baiyulan Open Institute on creating a set of standardized data licenses for AI training and data publication; digital rights projects, and their Fintech data collaboration which aims to address the data divide and help organisations harness the benefits of data.
Q: What are some of the projects you are working on?
Open Data China currently works on three streams: governance of key digital resources (e.g. data), open governance of digital rights, and business models for openness. One of our flagship projects for this year is that we are working with Shanghai Baiyulan Open Institute on creating a set of standardized data licenses for AI training and data publication. Another flagship project we are working on is a Fintech data collaboration which is part of Microsoft and ODI data collaboration peer learning network. We also have a project looking at digital rights called “Layman’s guide to digital right” where we help ordinary citizens to understand technical terms, explore existing ideas and tools that can help people defend their digital rights, and the last but most important element is to encourage people to be more active in participating in and contributing to discussions and policy-making process around digital rights protection.
Q: What is your vision for Open Data China?
We are still at an early stage of finding the right business model and funding sources to sustain our efforts in a longer term. We expect that we can identify new opportunities as the global and local narratives and demands around openness are changing. Our aim is to survive and grow, then make a large scale impact to become the leading brand for openness in China.
Q: What are some of the community projects you have worked on and what were the results?
Shanghai Open Data Apps (SODA) was the most famous and the longest project we operated during 2015-2018. It was originally designed as a local open data competition program and later evolved into a framework/model on how to operate a community-based open data ecosystem. As a result of this program, we unlocked over 60 high value datasets from 30+ local agencies and companies. Over 1000 applications and papers were generated based upon those datasets and 10+ startups were born from the competitions. You can find more about it from the articles we wrote on Paris Innovation Review.
Given China is currently pushing a new wave of making data accessible and usable, we are pretty much concerned about how data is governed, what and how data will be put in good use, and how transparent and accountable such a governance process is. We believe our concerns are aligned with the key research questions asked by GDB and by being involved in the GDB network, we can receive global support with like-minded peers and further advance and guide our own local work based upon GDB methodology.
Q: What are some of the data-related projects you have worked on that have made contributions to long term goals of Open Data China?
Open Data China is a long-term contributor to the previous Open Data Barometer project (ODB). Under the collaboration between Open Data China and Fudan University, we built up a China Open Data Lens based upon a localized version of ODB methodology. As a result, since 2016 Fudan University annually publishes a report to track the local open data progress across China. Open Data China also offers data support to the Shanghai Academy of Social Science that publishes an annual report on global cities’ open data. The report compares the open data performance between China cities including Shanghai, Beijing and Shenzhen with cities such as New York, London and Singapore. By supporting those projects we are able to engage a large network of organizations and researchers in tracking the progress of open data in China and also attract media in following news about open data development.
Q: Looking at the state of data in China, would you say there is progress in terms of government commitment to sharing open data?
Yes, definitely. In terms of the policy and legal context, China in recent years has listed open data as one of its key efforts on advancing the big data industry agenda, and has grown open data portals from 3 back in 2014 to over 150 now in 2021. A national portal has been built and is ready to be launched. The nation also has special regulation on scientific data—requiring that all public-funded research must share data. However with all that good news, there are still potential threats. For instance, there is ongoing discussion on monetizing public data which may threaten open data efforts. Also China currently has a very special framework that categorizes government data into non-open data, non-conditional open data (which is the normal open data) and conditional open data which is composed of different modes of data access. This framework is dramatically different from the original concept of open data thus may create new challenges in achieving real open data in China. You may find more details from the talk “Open Data in China: A ten year review” given by our Director Dr Feng Gao on the ODI Lunchtime Talk series.
Q: Where do you think your work and the work of the GDB intersect?
Given China is currently pushing a new wave of making data accessible and usable, we are pretty much concerned about how data is governed, what and how data will be put in good use, and how transparent and accountable such a governance process is. We believe our concerns are aligned with the key research questions asked by GDB and by being involved in the GDB network, we can receive global support with like-minded peers and further advance and guide our own local work based upon GDB methodology.
Photo by: Open Data China.
