Who we are

<!DOCTYPE html> <html lang='en-gb' data-theme="light"> <head> <meta charset='UTF-8' /> <meta name='viewport' content='width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0' /> <title> Who we are </title> <link rel="icon" href="/assets/favicon.ico"> <link rel="stylesheet" href="/assets/css/styles.css"> <meta property="og:title" content="Who we are"/> <meta property="og:type" content="website"/> <meta property="og:url" content="https://okfn.org"/> <meta property="og:description" content=""/> <meta property="og:image" content="https://storage.googleapis.com/django-statics-okf-website-production/organisation/sidebar/images/okfn-standard-thumb.png"/> <script defer data-domain="okfn.org" src="https://plausible.io/js/plausible.js"></script> </head> <body> <input type="checkbox" class="main-nav__switcher-indicator" id="main-nav__switcher-indicator"> <div class="root"> <div class="master -has-bg-circle -bg-circle-lg before:left-1/2 before:-translate-y-1/2"> <div class="container">  <header class="main-header 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Directory</a> </li> <li class=""> <a class="" href="https://network.okfn.org/project/">Project Repository</a> </li> <li class=""> <a class="" href="https://opendataday.org/">Open Data Day</a> </li> <li class=""> <a class="" href="https://discuss.okfn.org/">Open Knowledge Forums</a> </li> </ul> </li> <li class=" main-nav__item -has-submenu has-children"> <a class=" labeled " ">News</a> <ul class="submenu"> <li class=""> <a class="" href="https://blog.okfn.org/">Blog</a> </li> <li class=""> <a class="" href="/en/newsroom/">Newsroom</a> </li> <li class=""> <a class="" href="https://us9.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=73f922f8e68e21a10efa21f02&id=32d370a7fc">Newsletter</a> </li> <li class=""> <a class="" href="/en/jobs/">Jobs & Opportunities</a> </li> </ul> </li> <li class="main-nav__item -search switcher"> <input type="checkbox" id="switch-search" class="switcher__indicator"> <label for="switch-search" class="switcher__trigger icon"> <span></span> </label> <form action="/search" class="switcher__target form main-header__search"> <div class="input-fake flex"> <input class="form-control flex-grow" name="q" type="text" /> <button class="flex-shrink-0"> <img src="/assets/img/icons/header-search.svg" class="max-w-none" alt="Search"> </button> </div> </form> </li> <li class="main-nav__item -has-submenu has-children"> <label> <img src="/assets/img/icons/header-globe.svg" class="max-w-none" alt="Language"> </label> <ul class="submenu"> <li> <a href="/en/who-we-are/">English</a> </li> <li> <a href="/es/quienes-somos/">Español</a> </li> </ul> </ul> </li> </ul> </div> </nav> </div> </header>   <section class="sect False "> <div class="page-opening mb-20 mt-20"> <h1 class="title">We are open advocates</h1> <div class="image"> <img src="https://storage.googleapis.com/django-statics-okf-website-production/headers/images/collaboration.png" alt="Collaboration" class="mx-auto mb-10 md:mb-0" alt=""> </div> <div class="description"> ‘Open knowledge’ is any content, information or data that people are free to use, re-use and redistribute — without any legal, tech or social restriction. </div> </div> </section>  <div class="sect -tighten-2 mb-20"> <div class="sect__content"> <figure class="img-set text-center mb-20"> <div class="image"> <img src="https://storage.googleapis.com/django-statics-okf-website-production/filer_public_thumbnails/filer_public/31/93/31938630-0d91-4da0-8974-4fe96dae3fda/pxl_20220512_131113140.jpg__1500x943_q85_subsampling-2.jpg" alt="" > </div> <figcaption class="text">Open Knowledge Symposium in Barcelona, May 2022</figcaption> </figure> </div> </div> <div class="sect mb-20"> <div class="sect__content"> <div class="flex items-center md:flex-row flex-col justify-center gap-2 mb-10"> <a href="/en/who-we-are/team/" class="btn-pill"> Team </a> <a href="/en/who-we-are/board/" class="btn-pill"> Board of Directors </a> <a href="/en/who-we-are/funders/" class="btn-pill"> Funders </a> <a href="/en/who-we-are/governance" class="btn-pill"> Governance </a> <a href="https://www.paypal.com/donate/?hosted_button_id=RRFW36P7AQUJL" target="_blank" class="btn-pill"> Donate </a> </div> </div> </div> <div class="sect -tighten-2 mb-20"> <div class="sect__content"> <div class="block-txt"> <p>Since 2004, the Open Knowledge Foundation has worked at the intersection of cutting-edge digital tools and a distributed network of communities and movements to serve the public interest with open knowledge. We create digital tools, equip people with skills, and expand digitally savvy networks that understand the transformative power of openness.<br> <br> Confronting the multi-complex challenges that the planet is facing today, we're working for open knowledge to be a guiding principle in designing the infrastructures and organisations of the future, inspiring and guiding those who want to transform our digital and physical world by building a free, sustainable and inclusive future.</p> </div> </div> </div> <div class="sect -tighten-2 mb-20"> <div class="sect__content">  <figure class="img-set -video -is-video" data-play-video="vaKfwNAa9CM"> <div class="image"> <img src="https://storage.googleapis.com/django-statics-okf-website-production/video/images/Screenshot-2023-06-03-at-16.59.25.jpg" class="" alt="Learn more about the OKFN"> <div class="iframe-video w-full !mb-0"> <div class="iframe-video__wrapper"> <iframe width="560" height="315" src="" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe> </div> </div> </div> <figcaption class="text"> Learn more about us </figcaption> </figure>  </div> </div> <div class="sect -tighten-1 mb-20"> <div class="sect__content"> <div class="grid md:grid-cols-2 gap-10 md:gap-3">   <div class="relative block px-4 lg:px-8 pt-5 lg:pt-10 pb-28 border-3 border-black bg-white bg-opacity-30 group"> <h3 class="title block mb-8 font-bold text-2xl">Mission</h3> <p>Our mission is to create a fair, sustainable and open digital future, advancing open knowledge as a design principle beyond just data. We will do it by guiding and supporting the creation of digital infrastructure, developing policies and methodologies, harnessing communities and advocating for literacies and standards in a sustainable, ethical and agile manner.</p> </div>   <div class="relative block px-4 lg:px-8 pt-5 lg:pt-10 pb-28 border-3 border-black bg-white bg-opacity-30 group"> <h3 class="title block mb-8 font-bold text-2xl">Vision</h3> <p>Our vision is that openness and open knowledge are adopted by every government, institution and movement to ensure access to critical information that will empower humans to solve the most pressing problems of our times, leading to a sustainable, fair and open future for all.</p> </div>  </div> </div> </div>  <div class="headline -tighten-1 text-center -has-bg-circle -bg-circle-okfn-purple before:top-full before:left-full before:-translate-y-1/2 before:-translate-x-1/2 mb-20"> <h1 class="col-span-full px-3 py-5 font-bold text-center text-h1"> <p>Our work in context</p> </h1> </div>  <div class="sect -tighten-2 mb-20"> <div class="sect__content"> <div class="block-txt"> <p>The world’s institutions are decaying rapidly by embracing a culture where knowledge is privatised, artificially restricted behind paywalls or secrecy laws, violently extracted from groups or even extinct due to neglect and austerity. The future world is being built by corporations in closed virtual reality spaces, blocking all possibilities of generativity and democracy from flourishing, or in closed rooms and opaque systems. <br> <br> The root of the problem is an institutional architecture designed for that to happen, limited literacies and skills of people to act on the problem and no effective models and tools to replace the current systems. Our hope and focus will be to reverse it and push for openness as a design principle to build future institutions. <br> <br> We believe it is time for new rules, models and tools that generate improved conditions for knowledge to be shared by all in a fair, free and open future. In the face of rising inequality, global threats to our shared environment, and fading social consensus, open knowledge is not simply the opposite of closed societies: it opposes misleading facts (about societal issues), illegible data (from scientific research), privatised information (held by tech platforms) and of course withheld documents (about government or corporate acts). Those elements can exist even in a technically 'open society'. Our mission is to enable a future where communities, tools and best practices exist to keep those threats to the health of our societies at bay. And do it as agile, scalable, and adaptable to local circumstances, as possible.</p> </div> </div> </div> <a class="article mb-20" href="https://blog.okfn.org/2023/01/16/open-knowledge-as-an-essential-design-principle-for-a-fair-sustainable-and-open-future/"> <div class="image"> <img src="https://storage.googleapis.com/django-statics-okf-website-production/article/images/Renata.jpg" alt="Renata Ávila, CEO"> </div> <div class="description"> <strong class="block mb-5 text-h3 title">Open Knowledge as an essential design principle for a fair, sustainable and open future</strong> <span class="font-mono text-okfn-sm author">Renata Ávila, CEO</span> </div> </a> <div class="list mb-20"> <h1 class="title">How we work</h1> <div class="content block-txt"> <ul> <li><p>We convey movements and include everyone. </p> <li><p>We build literacies.</p> <li><p>We design technical and social infrastructure for our new digital future.</p> <li><p>We do it from different continents and combine disciplines. </p> <li><p>We do everything to be copied, scaled and adapted. </p> <li><p>We put people and the planet first.</p> </ul> </div> </div>  <div class="headline -tighten-1 text-center False mb-20"> <h1 class="col-span-full px-3 py-5 font-bold text-center text-h2"> <p>How we work together</p> </h1> </div>  <div class="sect -tighten-2 mb-20"> <div class="sect__content"> <div class="block-txt"> <p>We work as an <strong>agile organisation</strong> of 15-20 experts distributed across the world, combining foundation work and services. The services are not a separate organisation or division but vehicles to sustain our work, test our innovations and escalate the impact of our technical tools, models and policies across other organisations and institutions.<br> <br> We work as an <strong>international network</strong>, conveying people to build a broader movement, expanding to cover institutions with aligned goals and movements, collectives and individuals who embrace and practice openness. <br> <br> We also build <strong>partnerships</strong>, assisting institutions and organisations in adopting openness as technology tools, organisational models, and competency frameworks for their teams and beyond. </p> </div> </div> </div>  <div class="page-closing mb-20"> <div class="page-closing__content" style="background-image: url(https://storage.googleapis.com/django-statics-okf-website-production/banner/images/bg-getintouch.jpg")> <div class="container"> <div class="content"> <div class="image"> <img src="https://storage.googleapis.com/django-statics-okf-website-production/banner/images/knowledge-1.png" alt="Let's build together a world where all knowledge is accessible to everyone"> </div> <div class="description"> Let's build together a world where all knowledge is<br> <strong>accessible to everyone</strong> </div> <a href="/contact" class="btn">Get in touch</a> </div> </div> </div> </div>   <section class="sect -tighten-1 mb-20 -has-bg-circle -bg-circle-lg before:top-full before:left-full before:-translate-y-1/2 before:-translate-x-1/2"> <div class="sect__content"> <div class="lg:flex lg:flex-row-reverse lg:items-center lg:gap-16"> <img class="mx-auto lg:flex-shrink-0" src="/assets/img/section-newsletter.png" alt=""> <div class="lg:flex-grow"> <h2 class="mb-5 text-h1 leading-none font-bold">Don't miss a thing</h2> <p class="mb-8 text-2xl leading-normal"> Stay on top of what's happening in the #OpenMovement around the world. 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