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, PhD candidate at U-Md & WV
I think the initial question is some what flawed. Its based on a couple of assumptions. The first assumption being that you can accurately measure a site like data.gov by site traffic and that by using that measurement data.gov is doing poorly. The second assumption is that data.gov traffic is currently flatlining.
Assumption #1
A graph like this needs some context. What site traffic numbers were people expecting? In context with other government sites, data.gov traffic doesn't seem that bad. Even the most popular US gov sites rarely top 2 million unique visitors (see usa.gov) with most gov sites averaging far less traffic than that with many more averaging far less traffic than a site like data.gov. Even in comparison to other websites that serve as a data market place or a data commons (i.e. infochimps) data.gov traffic fares well in comparison. Finally I'm not even sure that site traffic is an effective or appropriate way of measuring a site like data.gov (see other comments)
Assumption #2
The site traffic graph of data.gov attached only displays the most recent year's worth of data. If you were to extend the graph back farther in time you would see a much different picture. You would see that data.gov averages the same amount of traffic more or less for the last couple of years with the exception being a sudden spike in early 2010 (see http://bit.ly/iiIuSw ). The very tail end of this spike is being displayed at the begin of the graph that is provided. If you look at the longer picture you will see that traffic didn't suddenly drop off or "flatline". Site traffic has remained fairly constant minus that sudden spike.
Ignoring those flaws I still believe that the proposed question being asked is a valid one. I think the real problem is that we still as a community have yet to have a robust conversation around who the actual or potential users of open government data are. Who are the expected users for data.gov? Citizens? journalists? researchers? educators? transparency advocates? commercial entities? entrepreneurs? government? Why are those specific groups of users participating or not participating? and are open government data sites like data.gov meeting their actual needs. As a community when talking about open government data we tend to lump all users into a single category. Different user groups will have different interest in open government data and will have different barriers to using it. So I think the next step is for us to "unpack" the word user and have a serious conversation about who the intended users for open government data are and what their needs/issues might be?
We also have to have realistic expectations for the users of open government data. Open government data sites like data.gov have several barriers to entry. In addition to time and interest, using raw data requires tools and skills (data literacy, statistical literacy, access to and understanding of software to process this raw data, etc). Most of these skills are well out of the reach of the average citizen. Without changing or improving these conditions I think that open government data sites like data.gov are not directly suitable for the average citizen.
Of course we can talk about changing the interface, adding different data, improving existing metadata, providing different formats, etc but without understanding who the users are and what their needs might be I think we can't really hope to successfully increase interest in data.gov.
We also need better metrics....
Assumption #1
A graph like this needs some context. What site traffic numbers were people expecting? In context with other government sites, data.gov traffic doesn't seem that bad. Even the most popular US gov sites rarely top 2 million unique visitors (see usa.gov) with most gov sites averaging far less traffic than that with many more averaging far less traffic than a site like data.gov. Even in comparison to other websites that serve as a data market place or a data commons (i.e. infochimps) data.gov traffic fares well in comparison. Finally I'm not even sure that site traffic is an effective or appropriate way of measuring a site like data.gov (see other comments)
Assumption #2
The site traffic graph of data.gov attached only displays the most recent year's worth of data. If you were to extend the graph back farther in time you would see a much different picture. You would see that data.gov averages the same amount of traffic more or less for the last couple of years with the exception being a sudden spike in early 2010 (see http://bit.ly/iiIuSw ). The very tail end of this spike is being displayed at the begin of the graph that is provided. If you look at the longer picture you will see that traffic didn't suddenly drop off or "flatline". Site traffic has remained fairly constant minus that sudden spike.
Ignoring those flaws I still believe that the proposed question being asked is a valid one. I think the real problem is that we still as a community have yet to have a robust conversation around who the actual or potential users of open government data are. Who are the expected users for data.gov? Citizens? journalists? researchers? educators? transparency advocates? commercial entities? entrepreneurs? government? Why are those specific groups of users participating or not participating? and are open government data sites like data.gov meeting their actual needs. As a community when talking about open government data we tend to lump all users into a single category. Different user groups will have different interest in open government data and will have different barriers to using it. So I think the next step is for us to "unpack" the word user and have a serious conversation about who the intended users for open government data are and what their needs/issues might be?
We also have to have realistic expectations for the users of open government data. Open government data sites like data.gov have several barriers to entry. In addition to time and interest, using raw data requires tools and skills (data literacy, statistical literacy, access to and understanding of software to process this raw data, etc). Most of these skills are well out of the reach of the average citizen. Without changing or improving these conditions I think that open government data sites like data.gov are not directly suitable for the average citizen.
Of course we can talk about changing the interface, adding different data, improving existing metadata, providing different formats, etc but without understanding who the users are and what their needs might be I think we can't really hope to successfully increase interest in data.gov.
We also need better metrics....
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1 edit
about 1 year ago
about 1 year ago