  Open data are characterized by a number of economic, technological,
innovative and social benefits. They are seen as a significant contributor to
the city's transformation into Smart City. This is all the more so when the
society is on the border of Society 5.0, i.e., shift from the information
society to a super smart society or society of imagination takes place.
However, the question constantly asked by open data experts is, what are the
key factors to be met and satisfied in order to achieve promised benefits? The
current trend of openness suggests that the principle of openness should be
followed not only by data but also research, education, software, standard,
hardware etc., it should become a philosophy to be followed at different
levels, in different domains. This should ensure greater transparency,
eliminating inequalities, promoting, and achieving sustainable development
goals. Therefore, many agendas now have openness as a prerequisite. This
chapter deals with concepts of open (government) data and Society 5.0 pointing
to their common objectives, providing some success stories of open data use in
smart cities or transformation of cities towards smart cities, mapping them to
the features of the Society 5.0. We believe that this trend develops a new form
of society, which we refer to as "open data-driven society". It forms a bridge
from Society 4.0 to Society 5.0. This Chapter attempts to identify the role of
openness in promoting human-centric Smart Society, Smart city, and Smart
Living.
