[ckan-discuss] Setting up CKAN for Romania?

[Liliana Bounegru]

Hello  everyone,

The first thing that came to my mind the first time I read about the Open
Knowledge Foundation (OKF) and the CKAN project was how much more useful and
urgent making data available in an easy to use and reuse format would be in
a country like Romania rather than UK perhaps. Especially when it comes to
government data, which is difficult to obtain by means of requests for
information or via government website. An even more serious problem could be
that many Romanians might not even be aware of their access to information
rights. My hope is that setting up this database for Romania would hopefully
contribute to transparency in local and national government operations and
bring some contribution to the fight against corruption.

I foresee some difficulties in setting this up also, starting from obtaining
the data (I don't expect Romanian authorities to respond to requests for
information as quickly as I saw that UK authorities do for documents posted
in the CKAN database), to media literacy, but I hope to get the support and
guidance necessary to get this project going from OKF.

Why do I want to make this project happen in Romania? As you may have
guessed, I am a 25 year old Romanian trying to find a way to contribute to
seeing some social change in Romania. After my attempts to make things
happen from the inside failed, I am now project coordinator for the European
Journalism Centre (Maastricht/Brussels), where I am working on a project
which aims to train journalists to make use of free and open online datasets
for reporting - Jonathan Gray (OKF)  will be giving a talk about this in our
upcoming event (www.datadrivenjournalism.net). In fall I will be starting a
Research Master in Media Studies at the University of Amsterdam, with a
grant offered by the Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture and Science.

I hope to have your support on this and looking forward to get things
started!


Regards,

Liliana
-- 
Liliana Bounegru
14 C Nassaulaan, 6224 KB Maastricht
The Netherlands
Tel. : +31 644 641 858
Email : liliana.bounegru at gmail.com
Website: http://newmediaideas.wordpress.com/
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