2025 Award: My Data
- Tawana Rogers
- Apr 15
- 2 min read
Congratulations to James Felton Keith on the 2025 Thought Leadership Award from My Data Global in Helsinki, Finland -- for his lates book Data Is Labor and his continued advocacy for equity distribution through the data asset class. The MyData Award celebrates exceptional achievement in building a more human-centric world.
We’ll be celebrating his work publicly at the MyData Awards Ceremony in June 2025 – stay tuned for your official invitation and details. The 2024-2025 MyData Awards help progress the MyData vision by recognising individuals and organisations who are making it happen — in business, technology, law and in society.
What is MyData?
MyData is a human-centric approach to personal data management, which combines industry need for data with digital human rights. MyData is an alternative vision which offers guiding technical principles for how we, as individuals, can have more control over the data trails we leave behind in our everyday actions. The core idea is that we should have an easier way to see where our personal data goes, specify who can use it, and alter these decisions over time.
Why?
The fair use of personal data is one of the most critical issues for shaping a sustainable and prosperous digital society.
Personal data has significant social, economic, and practical value. It holds the key to improving a range of services and products provided by governments, companies, and organisations. But personal data-based services must be built on mutual trust.
Today, having personal data stored in your service is a liability. Having permission to use a piece of data is an asset. Companies who grasp this early enough, are in a better position in the newly emerging data economy. Whole industries – such as energy, health and wellbeing, and finance – are already being disrupted by this trend.
JFK has this to say:
I'm just an advocate for people's intrinsic value and and activist for helping them capture it. I remember meeting some of the early My Data Conference team in DC, back in the late 2010s and it has been great to see their staying power and leadership out of Europe. We need to match their energy on every continent.
If you would like to follow along, JFK has been writing OpEd's and Podcasting on the Data Is Labor book via Forbes Business Council and Spotify respectively.
Get the book or the hoodie.
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