Open Aid Projekt ist jetzt teil der Open Knowledge Foundation

Somebody said mergers are a sign of consolidation and maturity. We do not know if that is true, but the Open Knowledge Foundation Germany and OpenAid will merge! As of now, OpenAid will be the “development project” of the Open Knowledge Foundation Germany. We are confident, that this is a very good development. OpenAid has been collaborating closely with OKFN in 2011 – particularly the Open Aid Data Conference was a joint effort of both organisations – supported by the Böll Foundation and the German offices of TI, Oxfam and ONE.

Both OpenAid and the Open Knowledge Foundation are small, independent organisations, driven by enthusiasm for open data and transparency. While OpenAid started out from aid transparency and moved into the sphere of open data, the Open Knowledge Foundation Germany initiated open data projects in Germany related to open spending, to traffic data and local crowdsourcing and started to work on aid issues in 2011.

In legal terms, the OpenAid association will cease to exist and all cooperations will be done under the umbrella of the Open Knowledge Foundation Germany. In practical terms there will only be minor changes. Claudia Schwegmann (founder of OpenAid) and Christian Kreutz (founder of Frankfurt Gestalten) will lead the OpenAid Project on behalf of the OKFN Germany. Claudia will continue her work on communication, networking and advocacy around open aid data and the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI). Christian will be responsible for data analysis and technical development.

The OpenAid website will be continue to be the virtual home of the OpenAid project. After a very successful Open Aid Data Conference in 2011 OpenAid is now planning a new event for autumn 2012 on aid transparency and open aid data. Other planned activities are a the visualisation of German aid and training on open data and IATI for NGOs. We are very excited about our joining of forces and look forward to work together under a single virtual roof and put aid transparency and open aid data on the agenda in Germany.