[okfn-announce] 4 Weeks Until OKFestival 2012 in Helsinki, FInland!

[Kat Braybrooke]

Hello Open Knowledge networks,

With only 4 weeks left until the OKFestival <http://okfestival.org> week
starts in Helsinki, here is our latest rundown of everything you need to
know about the event. We’re very excited about what's in store for
participants this year, so it would be great if you could share the details
with your contacts. You can also find the text below on the OKFN blog at <
http://ow.ly/d768h>. Thank you so much in advance, and we look forward to
meeting many of you next month!

*** 2012 FESTIVAL OVERVIEW ***

For those new to OKFestival, we are delighted to invite you to this year's
event in Helsinki, Finland - a series of hands-on workshops, talks,
hackathons, meetings and sprints organised by a wide range of open
knowledge communities around the globe. OKFestival 2012 combines the themes
of our annual Open Government Data Camp (OGDCamp) and Open Knowledge
Conference (OKCon) into a week of action and inspiration organised by the
Open Knowledge Foundation, the Finnish Institute in London and Aalto Media
Factory along with hundreds of Guest Programme Planners. With 400 tickets
already reserved by participants from more than 40 nations, OKFestival is
the one of the world's largest open knowledge events to date.

*** DATES & ACCOMMODATION ***

OKFestival 2012 runs from Monday 17th to Saturday 22nd of September. We
offer both day and week tickets, with week tickets covering all three of
OKFestival’s action-packed Core Conference Days <
http://okfestival.org/schedule> from Tuesday 18th September to Thursday
20th September. A variety of Satellite Events are also running before and
after the event, with a summary and debrief day on Friday 21st September.
>From Couchsurfing with Finnish locals to hotels in downtown Helsinki, there
are many affordable travel and accommodation options available to make your
stay in Finland a great one at <http://okfestival.org/accommodation>.

*** FESTIVAL PROGRAMMING ***

The 2012 theme of OKFestival is 'Open Knowledge in Action', looking at the
value that can be generated by opening up knowledge, the ecosystems of
organisations that can benefit from this, and the impacts that transparency
can have in our societies. This year's schedule is diverse, with over 13
guest-planned Topic Streams from "Transparency and Accountability" to
"Openness in Sustainability" including programming such as:

* A series of hackathons and coding jams, including a Green Hackathon with
CESC, hackathons about Building the Cultural Commons and Open Science, and
an introductory coding jam with RailsGirls Finland.
* A variety of participatory sessions, from hands-on open hardware
workshops in Finland's first FABlab to the world's first Art of Open Data
Cooking workshop to sessions on the School of Data.
* A set of in-depth meetings on different topics related to openness, from
developer meetups about Open Source software with Finland's OpenMind
conference, to sessions on the Open Government Partnership and the EU
Citizens' Initiative, to a live broadcast between innovation hubs in
Finland and Africa.
* An increasingly-imminent list of Featured Speakers<
http://okfestival.org/guest-speakers/> from the Gapminder Foundation's Hans
Rosling to Member of European Parliament Anneli Jäätteenmäki to the World
Bank's Carlos Rossel to the Free Software Foundation's Karsten Gerloff to
Climate Change Capital's James Cameron.

*** BUY YOUR TICKETS TODAY ***

Tickets are now available online at <
http://okfestival.org/early-bird-okfest-tickets> . Reserve yours now to
join the largest open knowledge crowd of the year in Finland. They are
selling fast, and our list of confirmed festival attendees <
http://okfestival.org/festival-attendees> continues to grow, with
participants from Jyväskylä to Guyana.

*** GET IN TOUCH ***

Have questions for our Topic Stream planners or the Core Organising Team?
Want to get involved by proposing a satellite or evening event? Feel free
to contact us at <http://okfestival.org/contact> and get involved on
Twitter using the hashtag '#OKFest', on Facebook at <
http://facebook.com/OpenKnowledgeFestival> and on the public Flickr Pool at
<http://www.flickr.com/groups/okfest/pool>.

See you in Helsinki!

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
| Kat Braybrooke | London, UK
| The Open Knowledge Foundation <http://okfn.org/>
| Coordinator of OKFestival 2012 <http://okfestival.org/> & Regional
Groups<http://okfn.org/chapters>
| Twitter @kat_braybrooke <http://twitter.com/kat_braybrooke> | Skype
@ardent_coeur
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