This is a guest blog post by the DATA (Datos Abiertos, Transparencia y Acceso a la información) Uruguay Team.
This year's OKFestival will play host to many new ideas, and this is one of them. We’ve created a space which allows “serendipity” to get to work, in contrast with the rest of the Festival; the largest, most complex and most meticulously organized event in the open knowledge community.
We're talking about a track that we’ve named “unFestival” (as in ‘unconference’) and which will run on both the Wednesday and Thursday (July 16 & 17). Along with the OKFestival Team, we wanted to give all the fabulous ideas which couldn’t fit into the Festival’s very tight schedule a place to shine, and at the same time, create a feedback space where people could elaborate on ideas and inspiration they’d had in reaction to various OKFestival sessions. This year, the OKFestival vision is to translate “Open Minds to Open Action“ and we think that this space will help us make that transition by giving a platform to anyone with a great idea, and encouraging them to share it.
Things will run similarly to how they would at a BarCamp; attendees can propose sessions throughout the morning (both online and at dedicated places around the venue), curation will take place during lunch and sessions will run throughout the afternoon offering two parallel spaces with a capacity of around 100 people. Every session will be transcribed and shared on OKFestival's website, and we welcome volunteers who want to help with either note taking and/or general facilitation – please let us know if you’re interested.
As DATA Uruguay, we are the team running this space – we'll work hard to reproduce that which made ABRE LATAM in Montevideo so amazing, applying what we learned and repeating what made it unforgettable to ensure that OKFestival’s unFestival is another stellar experience. (ABRE LATAM 2014 itself will take place in México this year – don’t miss it!). Also, we want to take this opportunity to thank Open Knowledge and their OKFestival Team (especially Beatrice Martini) for their trust and the opportunity to make this happen.
We really hope this sounds as fun for you as it is for us! The DATA URUGUAY team is open to feedback, suggestions and help in any form, so keep in touch with us through the @OKunFestival Twitter account, where you can follow all the news about this exciting track before the event and then learn about sessions and everything going on there once the event is running. See you in Berlin!