“Think together, create together” - We encourage citizens and governments to share ideas and solutions with an open mind for making future cities.
Program Description
Code for Japan is connecting citizens and governments. For supporting citizens, we are building local Code for communities. On the government side, we are running fellowship program for changing the government from inside of it.
Founding Story
Hal Seki, a founder of Code for Japan, started Code for Japan in June 2013. Since 2011, Hal has been a technology activist in the open data movement after leading some projects that supported the people injured by the massive earthquake which occurred in the Tohoku region of Japan. It was then that he realized the real value of the open data movement. Open data is not just about data but a way to create an open community with the people who want to make the world better with governments. In May 2013, he went to the Personal Democracy Forum to discuss the possibility of starting Code for Japan with Catherine Bracy. With Catherine’s encouragement, he kicked of Code for Japan with the same people who were gathered at the first meeting.
People
Hal Seki
Hal Seki has been working as a Geo Developer since 2002. He was also well known as a community manager for solving social issues by technology and tools in Japan. Also, He is entitled as Ushahidi Certificated Developer since he has been a managing director of Sinsai.info, a cloud sourcing platform for collecting crisis information using Ushahidi since 2011, the east Japan earthquake occurred. He is also a member of Open Knowledge of Foundation Japan and OpenStreetMap Foundation Japan.
Yusuke Takagi
Yusuke Takagi has been working on government projects as a CEO of Automation inc, a system integration company. He learned about the public procurement process of government and found issues of the process. His specialty is designing architect of IT system.
Nobuyuki Shirakawa
Nobuyuki Shirakawa is an administrative director and a member of board of directors of the Code for Japan. He also serves not only as a project assistant professor of Keio University SFC but also as a Senior Researcher of the Technology Strategy Center, NEDO. Mr. Shirakawa became a researcher of Science, Technology and Innovation Policy, after working as a staff of the Hiroshima Prefectural Government in Japan for a decade. His specialty is public policy and evaluation based upon his hands-on experience in management and industry-academia collaboration in the field of industrial technologies ranging from agriculture to health and medicine.
