Open Finland Challenge – what is it all about?
Open Finland Challenge (previously known as Apps4Finland) is arranged now for the 7th consecutive year and is possibly the largest “digital openness innovation contest” in the Nordic region. Open Finland Challenge is open to individuals, teams, collectives, researchers, startups and companies – regardless of background.
Open Finland Challenge looks for the best applications, services, concepts and ideas, which support active citizenship, improve services or enable a more open and efficient government. Competition entries should make use of open data, open APIs, open source, open licenses, or otherwise enhance openness. The competition entries can be e.g. new services, applications, visualizations, digital content or service concepts. If your entry is complete – submit it now!
This year we are collaborating with Ultrahack 48h hackathon organized just before Slush, the largest ICT event in Europe, and with the worldwide Smart City App Hack competition. This way, developers and innovators have a remarkable set of opportunities, in Finland and abroad.
Is your work ready – or have you not even thought about it? Follow these steps. The last day to submit your entries is November 9, 2015. You can already submit your entries NOW.
Are you pondering whether you will have time to submit or an entry – or if your idea is suitable in the first place?
If you have an idea, it is probably great! If you don’t have an idea yet, you can use the current challenges our partners have set as inspiration, or have a look at last year’s Apps4Finland entries. See also the resources page, opendata.fi data catalog and the public listing of API’s.
Think about all the great ideas you’ve had and things you have already done this year – for example, in various events. You probably have more ideas than you realize! Even if you have not started…some of the past years’ award-winners have been made at the 11th hour. Just in the last week, there were many ideas spawned in the various developers – up for grabs and development.
Ultrahack (see below) is a fantastic code development camp, for finalizing (or even starting) the development of your idea.
Helsinki regional competition winner travels to Barcelona to pitch.
Smart City App Hack entries can be developed further for Open Finland Challenge, and will be automatically taken into the national Open Finland Challenge competition.
Open Finland Challenge taking part in Ultrahack – part of Europe’s largest hackathon
As part of the largest hackathon in Europe, the 48-hour Ultrahack is organized November 6-8 at the old Konepaja Bruno in Vallila, Helsinki. During the weekend, over 500 people from Finland and abroad are gathering together for 48 hours to develop and work together, as a warmup to Slush.
As a part of this, 20 teams will be selected to develop new services in the “Smart City – Civic Tech” -track, which promotes digital openness in general. Open Knowledge Finland, Open Finland Challenge and the City of Helsinki are hosting this track, in collaboration with Teosto, YLE, Suomi24, THL and Forum Virium Helsinki.
The Smart City challenge is to come up with a functioning application that leverages Open Data in an innovative and diverse way. The City of Helsinki is a pioneer and leader in opening its data repositories. Now the city wants to encourage developers to come up with new kinds of applications, visualizations and dashboards using Open Data – for example, shedding light on
- What is taking place in Helsinki or how things are evolving.
- Mobile applications that help tourist find interesting locations and events
- Allowing citizens to take part in the public decision-making process
Ultrahack features a 20 000 euro main prize, and the Smart City – Civic Tech -track in itself has over 5 000 euros of prizes. All participants also get a free ticker to Slush (worth some 300 euros) and the teams automatically participate in Open Finland Challenge, too! So, many opportunities.
Register at https://os.ultrahack.org/register/ latest by Oct 30, 2015 – teams are accepted into the hackathon weekly, so sign up fast to make sure you are accepted on time. Travel stipends are also awarded weekly. If you are still missing some members of a team – you can still register your idea, and ask for team members. See you there – it will be great!
Developer events in October
During the fall of 2015, there are over 20 developer events and other special events in over 10 cities across Finland. These are fantastic opportunities to build your team, showcase your skills, or get feedback and advice from our partners. Check out the events in the event calendar.
Espoo: Mini Maker Faire 17.-18.10.2015
Konfabulaari 19.10.2015
Lappeenranta: #DevShark Tour – IoT and open data 19.10.2015
Open Science workshop 20.10.
Open Finland Challenge – Ultrahack -webinar 20.10.
Turku Open Data Roadshow 22.10.2015
Turku DevShark tour 22.10.2015
Tampere: Smart City Hack 24.-25.10. 2015 (ks. alla)
Hel <3 Developers 29.10.2015
Ultrahack 6.-8.11
Open Finland Challenge deadline 9.11.2015
Open Finland Challenge awards 3.12.2015
Turku – Open Data Roadshow meets Ultrahack tour – to 22.10.
Open Knowledge Finland, City of Turku, Lounaispaikka and Turku Science Park Oy are arranging the third Open Data Roadshow in Turku. The event brings together public sector, companies, researchers and students to work together and gain insights how to use open data. This time, plenty of developers are at the event, as it is a collaboration together with Ultrahack, the largest hackathon in Europe. In Turku, Ultrahack and Open Finland Challenge partners YLE, THL, Teosto and Suomi24 are present.
Open Data Roadshow program and registration: http://www.meetup.com/Open-Data-Southwest-Finland/events/225226627/
As consumer we use games, apps and various services daily that offer us personalized experiences, many of which have a gamification aspect. Yet, we don’t always get the same experience with the public services we use daily. It’s time to change that. The city of Turku, and cities across the world, are opening up data and working with developers to create better services for their communities. Join us for another session of #DevShark, this time working with the city and Slush Hacks to challenge and reward the best cases. During the day you’ll hear from various experts, from technical providers, the city and various open data experts.
Program and regitration for Ultrahack / Slush Hacks -session: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/devshark-tour-gamifying-civic-tech-turku-tickets-18593232860
Follow Open Finland Challege:
- Website: http://openfinlandchallenge.fi/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/openfinlandchallenge
- Twitter: @OpenFinland
- Subscribe for the newsletter here.
More information:
Teemu Ropponen
Open Finland Challenge 2015
teemu.ropponen(at)okf.fi
phone: +358 40 525 5153
@troppone
https://forumvirium.fi/en/project-areas/smart-city/open-finland-challenge