A great hope in research data underpinned the 9th RDA plenary meeting. Almost all speeches –from Mark Parsons’ speech, the RDA Secretary General, to Fabrizio Gagliardi’s speech, the Senior Strategy Advisor of Barcelona Supercomputing Center, to those of the European Commission representatives- all these speeches gave hope in the future of research data, in their release and their reuse. But is that a reality or only an illusion fostered by a small community of data experts?