Link Digital is proud this year to continue our support of the annual open government data
competition GovHack, which will take place on August 18-20.
A “hack” is the process of taking something and improving it or making it better. GovHack is
a two-day ‘hackathon’, from Friday night to Sunday evening, during which participants must
create something clever or engaging using existing government data. Participants produce a
pilot project that uses government data in some new or innovative way and an
accompanying video that explains what they have done.
First run by Australian National University in 2009, GovHack now takes place in metropolitan
and regional locations across Australia and New Zealand and attracts participants from
around the world.
One of the reasons Link Digital remains a keen supporter of GovHack is that its values align
with those we seek to model in our everyday work for clients: bringing together a diverse
range of stakeholders from the government, industry, not for profits and academia to
showcase the practical economic and social benefits of open data.
The event leverages off the creativity and experience of the community in such as a way as
to highlight how government can be a subscriber and a contributor rather than the sole
owner of the public data it collects, and through this enhance its services and mission.
GovHack also plays an invaluable role in exposing new people to data science, building their
digital skills and increasing their awareness of the broader benefits of open data and
particularly open government data, and its potential to solve the challenges we face.
Since GovHack started, over 2,500 projects have been published by participants to
demonstrate the practical value of open data. Some of these have been picked up by
government, including the government energy rating app and improvements to how
Treasury can make budget data more easily accessible.
Link Digital has been an active supporter of GovHack for over a decade and this year we are
proud local ACT sponsor of the event.
