Big Data Week

The Cook County Board of Commissioners proclaimed April 23-27 as Open Data Week. To that end, the Cook County Bureau of Technology has filled the week with events and items on how government data is changing the way people perceive government, economic development, digital entrepreneurship, and civic involvement.

Highlights of Open Data Week include a roundtable discussion on how government data is creating opportunities for digital entrepreneurship and job creation. The discussion, titled “Changing the Code: Government Data and Digital Entrepreneurship” will be streamed live on April 25^th at the Cook County data website, http://data.cookcountyil.gov.

On Friday, April 27^th, the County, the State of Illinois, and Socrata, a data archive company, will live stream a webcast on the new regional data portal, MetroDataChicago.org (http://metrochicagodata.org). During the broadcast, viewers will learn more about how the portal works, how to use data found there, and what are the goals of the County and State going forward.

The County will also release new and updated datasets.

The County is also partnering with global Big Data Week (https://bigdataweek.com) for an international angle to local data. Big Data is an emerging data science that allows organizations to analyze very large datasets, find patterns, create predictive models, and help understand more about the vast amounts of data generated by the public. During Big Data Week, Cook County is hosting a webinar showcasing the projects and achievements of local Big Data developers on April 27^th, and co-sponsoring a hackathon competition on April 28^th.

Here is the lineup for Cook County’s Open Data Week:

Throughout the week:

Release new & updated datasets.
“Changing the Code: Government Data and Digital Entrepreneurship” webinar, Wednesday, 4/25, 11:30 am to 12:30 pm –How government data is creating new opportunities for digital entrepreneurs and businesses.
”Open and Big Data Developers Showcase” webinar, Thursday, 4/26, starting at 7:00 pm–Big and Open Data developers will pitch do 10-20 minute pitches on their business, app, etc.
“A Guided Tour of MetroChicagoData.org” webinar Friday, 4/27, 11:30 am to 1:00 pm–County and State officials will provide an in-depth look at the new regional data portal.
Global Big Data hackathon competition, Saturday, 4/28 and Sunday 4/29, 7:00 am to 7:00 am–Teams of developers in Chicago, New York, San Francisco, London, Melbourne, Berlin, Canberra and Finland will compete to use Cook County/State of Illinois data to build the best data analysis model.