Introduction

The key vocabulary:

1. Commons Data; Commons Data Centers
2. Data Coalitions
3. Data Commons
4. Data Cooperatives
5. Data Dividends
6. Data Property Rights, i.e. Data Ownership
7. Data Trust
8. Data Unions

Related:

1. Technological Sovereignty

Examples

• The Good Data which allows people to control data flow at a browser level with benefits going to social causes and

• the Swiss-based Health Bank where personal health data is aggregated for the advancement of medicine,

• Global Alliance for Genomics and Health: James Hazard: "At the initiative of the Broad Institute, they formed The Global Alliance for Genomics and Health (GA4GH), to improve standards and interoperability. John Wilbanks is working on this and the GA4GH has done a model patient consent." [1]

• Data Sharing by a Municipality:James Hazard: "Working with people from Kansas City, the UMKC Law School, Code for America, and MIT Media Lab on model data sharing agreements for municipalities." Data sharing agreements are licenses and municipalities are working the same issues of public/private/commons. [2]

• The Ubiquitous Commons project: "designing a legal+technological toolkit with which you reappropriate data you produce (social networks, wearables, biotech, IoT, sensors, domotics...), you establish a identity+trust+responsibility model and you distribute access through a p2p infrastructure"

• Mnémotix, in France "invents solidarity and cooperative smart data"

See also:

• Our Data Coop‎‎
• NordicDEi‎
• Give Me My Data‎
• Our Data Mutual‎
• Open Data Mutual‎
• Good Data
• Salus Coop

Revenue Models

• Cooperative Business Models for Open Data

Quotes

Data are a collective resource

"The critical insight motivating our plan is that the economic value of data primarily comes from the data aggregation generated by large groups, rather than from any one individual. The rapidly emerging new generation of Artificial Intelligence (AI) based technologies do not focus on analyzing one person’s individual data. Rather, AI “learns” from aggregated data sets and generates value by applying these insights back to individuals. Thus, to design a data dividend, we must think in terms of “our data”, not “my data.” The same aggregation effect is true for data brokers and other benefactors of the data-driven economy that have already created profitable markets in personal information. Thus, the best way to mitigate the harms of this economy – such as increased inequality, lack of access to opportunities, and the rise of powerful platform monopolies – is to treat data as a collective resource that must be managed through proper institutions rather than an as individual asset."

- Berggruen Institute [3]

Key Resources

Key Articles

• Alex Pentland's Vision for Credit Unions as Vehicles for Data Cooperatives

Key Individuals

• Igor Calzada

• Bruno Carballa

• Annemarie Naylor

Key Movements

• Citizens for Open Access to Civic Information and Data: CivicAccess is an Open Government Data group in Canada. [4]
• CoopData: shared open data models and standards for inter-cooperative cooperation [5]
• Data Commons Cooperative: "greases the flow of data between communities in the cooperative, solidarity economy. The co-op not only serves these communities, it is owned by them". [6]
• Fair Data Society: "a non-profit initiative that is reimagining the data economy and creating a fair and decentralised data layer". [7]
• Municipal Open Data Movement

Key Policy Documents

• Charter for Building a Data Commons for a Free, Fair and Sustainable Future [8]
• Report by the Berggruen Institute: A Data Dividend That Works
• Hippocratic Oath for the Data Scientist
• Amsterdam Manifesto on Data Citation Principles

Key Reports

• Report: Nicole, S., Vance-Law, S., Spelliscy, C., Bell, J. (2025, January). Towards Data Cooperatives for a Sustainable Digital Economy. Project Liberty Institute & Decentralization Research Center.

[9]. See: How Data Cooperatives Can Help Build a Fair Data Economy

Barcelona

• Barcelona Manifesto in Favour of Technological Sovereignty and Digital Rights for Cities
• Ethical and Responsible Data Management of the Barcelona Data Commons; [10]
• Ethical Digital Standards Policy ToolKit: "An open source Policy Toolkit for cities to develop digital policies that put citizens at the center and make Governments more open, transparent, and collaborative". [11]

Key Research

• Case Studies Exploring Principles for Data Stewardship. An open set of case studies exploring principles for data stewardship. [12]

• DEcentralised Citizen-owned Data Ecosystems: DECODE is a EU-funded research and trialling project on data-ownership by citizens, with Barcelona and Amsterdam as participants

[13]

• • Digital Democracy and Data Commons: "a participatory platform to deliberate and construct alternative and more democratic forms of data governance". (in Barcelona, Spain)

[14]

Database Selection

1. Data Commons Project
2. Open Data Commons
3. Jordan Hatcher on the Open Data Commons
4. Barcelona City Data Commons
5. Data Commons License
6. Genomic Data Commons
7. Open Data and the Commons
8. Data Commons Cooperative
9. Charter for Building a Data Commons for a Free, Fair and Sustainable Future
10. Big Data Commons
11. Governance of the Data Commons
12. Commons Data Centers
13. Commons Data
14. From Open Data To Commons Data
15. Data Commons for Food Security