Open Data Explorer: An End-to-end Tool for Data Storytelling using Open Data

Enabling users to better understand government actions is one reason why governments have sought to open their data to the public. Data storytelling tools help to achieve this goal by facilitating users to turn data into stories. However, existing tools are not able to provide the necessary features to overcome the barriers users face at different data storytelling stages. This paper provides findings regarding the features in the design of these data storytelling tools in the open data context and also presents a generic and end-to-end tool called ODE, which helps users through the different data storytelling stages. To achieve the paper’s objectives, a literature review was first conducted to collect the features needed for the different data storytelling stages. Then, the identified features were integrated into ODE and its effectiveness in helping users to easily turn data into stories was demonstrated through an evaluation involving 11 users

Open Data Explorer:An End-to-end Tool for Data Storytelling using Open Data

Enabling users to better understand government actions is one reason why governments have sought to open their data to the public. Data storytelling tools help to achieve this goal by facilitating users to turn data into stories. However, existing tools are not able to provide the necessary features to overcome the barriers users face at different data storytelling stages. This paper provides findings regarding the features in the design of these data storytelling tools in the open data context and also presents a generic and end-to-end tool called ODE, which helps users through the different data storytelling stages. To achieve the paper’s objectives, a literature review was first conducted to collect the features needed for the different data storytelling stages. Then, the identified features were integrated into ODE and its effectiveness in helping users to easily turn data into stories was demonstrated through an evaluation involving 11 users

Influence of the regulatory framework on transparency: Analysis of the Spanish municipalities, 2014-‍2017

The objective of this work is to assess the capacity of the regulatory framework on the issue transparency to achieve the sought-after transparency in the management of public administrations. To this end, the existing literature focused on international experiences is reviewed, identifying works looking at one law or set of laws and measure the degree of transparency at a date after their entry into force. Subsequently, we analyze the case of big Spanish municipalities in connection with Act 19/2013 on Transparency, Access to Public Information and Good Governance. We thus use the levels of transparency published, mainly by the SIELOCAL Index for 2014 (year when the law came into force) and 2017. These data are also checked against the index prepared and published by Transparency International Spain. The results show a significant relationship between the law and achievements in terms of transparency; yet, the conclusions of our research present the evolution of transparency not only as a result of the regulatory framework, but as a result of a set of factors.</span

Engaging Citizens with a Social Platform for Open Data

Open Data are valuable initiatives in favour of transparency. Public administrations are increasing the availability of datasets for citizens, associations, innovators and other stakeholders, by releasing their data with open licenses. Open initiatives are achieving less success than expected, mainly due to the lack of engagement. There is a growing demand for approaches to actively engage citizens in exploiting Open Data. This paper introduces SPOD, a Social Platform for Open Data, which aims to engage citizens, local associations and organizations in forming communities of interests, stimulating the interpretation of Open Data and exploiting their use in Data-driven discussions, something not well-supported on traditional social networks. Social collaboration is the key aspect to increase the public value, where citizens participate in the discussions, co-create knowledge and data. The paper describes the engagement of four communities of citizens, which contributed to the public value by discussing topics in the context of Cultural Heritage, generating information from existing and co-created open datasets, by using SPO