mySociety is currently helping to support knowledge-sharing between organisations and individuals who run Access to Information projects around the world, in a community of practice.

Several such folk were in London for our TICTeC conference last month, providing a perfect opportunity to come together in person and share insights.

Matt Stempeck of the Civic Tech Field Guide has written the discussions up in full (he also deftly explains the slight difference, terminology-wise, between Freedom of Information and Access to Information) and you can read his account here.

Meanwhile, here are the top-line topics that were under discussion:

• Logistics How do you facilitate a community of very busy people, spread across multiple countries and speaking different languages — and how do you ensure that interventions are timely and productive? The group discussed which types on online communication and touchpoints work best for them; how to ensure topics are relevant to their immediate needs; and on which platforms it’s possible to talk about challenges just as freely as successes.
• Measuring impact Are there consistent metrics we could be collecting across all ATI projects to demonstrate and compare impact? What are the individual issues experienced by each project that impede the collection of such metrics?
• Governments What are the issues that groups face within different countries, with differing levels of governmental tolerance towards ATI?
• Engagement How do projects educate the public about their rights to information, and encourage more of them to use these rights?
• Journalism How can ATI projects work with newsrooms or individual journalists to discover stories and, incidentally, also help spread awareness of ATI? In which ways does the ATI process not fit well with journalists’ needs?
• Funding One area where the network can offer useful peer support is in swapping notes over where they source funding, and other potential channels of income. Some funders were also present, and so were able to give their valuable perspectives too.

If any of these topics spark your interest, hop over to Matt’s account for the full details.

mySociety is supporting the international Access to Information community of practice alongside the Civic Tech Field Guide, Access Info Europe and Open Knowledge Germany.

—

Banner image: James Cameron