Open Knowledge

Open Knowledge is a term used to denote a set of principles and methodologies related to the production and distribution of knowledge works in an open manner. Knowledge is interpreted broadly to include:

• Data -- scientific, historical, geographic or otherwise
• Content such as music, films or books
• General information for example that produced by government and other administrative bodies

As set out in the Open Knowledge Definition, knowledge is open if "one is free to use, reuse, and redistribute it without legal, social or technological restriction."

In this sense Open Knowledge can be seen as being a superset of Open Data, Open Content, Open Access with the aim of highlighting the commonalities between these different groups. The concept is also heavily related to Open Source, with many concepts and processes directly borrowed (or 'ported') from previous work on Open Source (for example the Open Knowledge Definition is directly derived from the Open Source Definition).

History

Similarly to other 'open' concepts such as Open Data and Open Content, though the term is rather new, the concept is old. For example, one of the earliest printed texts of which we have record is a copy of the Buddhist Diamond sutra produced in China around 868AD, and in it can be found the dedication: "for universal free distribution"^[1].

Organisations and Activities promoting Open Knowledge

• Alliance for Taxpayer Access (ATA)
• Enabling Open Scholarship (EOS)
• Open Knowledge Foundation (http://www.okfn.org/)
  • The Open Knowledge Definition
• Open Source Geodata
• OpenStreetMap
• Science Commons
• SPARC (Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition)
• Talis

See also

• Definition of Free Cultural Works
• Open Access Directory
• Open access (publishing)
• Open Content
• Open Data
• Open Knowledge Network
• Open Source
• Business Intelligence 2.0 (BI 2.0)

References

1. ^ The Value of the Public Domain