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The competition on the development of applications using the public sector information (PSI) on the Government's Data.One portal (data.one.gov.hk) opened for enrolment today (November 1).
A spokesman for the Office of the Government Chief Information Officer said, "PSI datasets can be used and meshed together to develop online services and mobile applications for research and analytics, enhancement of services to the public or opening up new business opportunities.
"The competition will encourage the development of innovative software applications with the use of datasets on Data.One and raise public awareness of the value and possibilities of PSI."
The competition will offer gold, silver and bronze awards with cash prizes of $50,000, $30,000 and $10,000 respectively. There will also be 10 merit prizes with a cash award of $5,000 each. An award presentation ceremony will be held on April 20 next year at the closing ceremony of the International IT Fest 2014.
The Government launched the Data.One portal in March 2011 to provide PSI in digital format for free use by the public. To date, 14 categories of PSI datasets are available on the portal, including road traffic information, air pollution indices, weather data, geo-referenced public facility data, population census statistics and property market statistics.
"To tie in with the competition and further promote the use of PSI, we will organise a series of talks at Cyberport, the Science Park, co-working spaces for technology companies and tertiary institutes. Industry players will be invited to share their experience and insight on the creative and value-added use of PSI," the spokesman added.
For details of the competition and the online entry form, please visit data.one.gov.hk/competition. The deadline for submission of entries is February 28, 2014.
Ends/Friday, November 1, 2013
Issued at HKT 18:03
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