Big Data, Small Apps: Premises and Products of the Civic Hackathon

Abstract

Connections and feedback among urban residents and the responsive city are critical to Urban Informatics. One of the main modes of interaction between the public and Big Data streams is the ever-expanding suite of urban-focused smartphone applications. Governments are joining the app trend by hosting civic hackathons focused on app development. For all the attention and effort spent on app production and hackathons, however, a closer examination reveals a glaring irony of the Big Data age: to date, the results have been remarkably small in both scope and users. In this paper, we critically analyze the structure of The White House Hackathon, New York City BigApps, and the National Day of Civic Hacking, which are three recent, high-publicity hackathons in the United States. We propose a taxonomy of civic apps, analyze hackathon models and results against the taxonomy, and evaluate how the hackathon structure influences the apps produced. In particular, we examine problem definitions embedded in the different models and the issue of sustaining apps past the hackathon. We question the effectiveness of apps as the interface between urban data and urban residents, asking who is represented by and participates in the solutions offered by apps. We determine that the transparency, collaboration and innovation that hackathons aspire to are not yet fully realized, leading to the question: can civic Big Data lead to big impacts?