The document discusses methods for engaging citizens in re-using public sector information (PSI) and enhancing open data utilization. It outlines various strategies, such as creating user profiles, establishing an open data marketplace, and incentivizing data usage through competitions and community events. Additionally, it emphasizes the importance of involving citizens in the data process and providing training to enhance their digital skills.

1. Raising awareness and engaging
citizens in re-using PSI
Yannis Charalabidis
University of the Aegean
Greece
W3C - Share PSI 2.0 Workshop, 17th March 2015, Timisoara, Romania
Daniel Pop
West University of Timisoara
Romania

2. Topics of the Workshop
• How can public bodies engage the potential reusers of their
data and/or services ?
• Which methodologies, channels, technical platforms have
been used ?
• What methods are available to reusers of your data to send
feedback about published data ?
• How do you handle feedback received so as to improve your
data ?
• Should data producers track use of, and demand for, data? If
so, how?
… or …

3. Ways to boost utilisation of
Open Data by citizens

4. Way #1: Give them a home
• An open data portal has to offer the ability to
citizens / users to create and maintain a profile
• Allow easy login via social media

5. Way #2: Make them customers / Create
an Open Data marketplace
• When a citizen cannot find the dataset he is looking
for, he can put a request that is channeled to the
appropriate administration

6. Way #3: Make them opendata publishers
• Allow for upload of datasets by users

7. Way #4: Allow working on datasets /
make them curators
• A dataset can be processed by a user and then
republished as a new version. Datasets can be
visualised, extended, linked by users

8. Way #5: Give them incentives
• Measure and publish popularity of the users, based
on their activity
• Give incentives for data usage / utilisation (e.g. free
tickets to community events, free parking to most
prominent users)
• Organisation of competitions / datathons with
prizes for the best applications
• Organisation of data journalism competitions for
users

9. Other Ways ? #6
• Rationale: people care about services – not
data. Also, we never ask them.
• So, involve them upfront: organise meetings
of interest groups (e.g. fin, env, etc) among
interested citizens and entreprises
• Questionnaires, too, for initial screening of
ideas and people

10. Other Ways ? #7
• Rationale: companies have different viewpoint
than citizens. Need quality, support, etc
• So, provide something like that for companies
and utilisation will be higher.
• Build communities

11. Other Ways ? #8
• Rationale: people might want to “make a
story” acting like data journalists, but they
might not have the skills needed
• So: make small groups among citizens to work
around open data, generating small or larger
stories

12. Other Ways ? #9
• Rationale: citizens without the proper
knowledge cannot take advantage of
incentives targeting (mainly) developers
• So: invest in training citizens on basic digital
skills (make a web site, work with a dataset,
write a story, etc)