Goodbye Statistical Yearbooks …. ?

The end for the traditional statistical yearbooks – be they printed or as ebooks – is approaching gradually.

The German yearbook has recently been hit. The last edition had its farewell at a press conference on 30 October 2019:
“Digitisation is shaping the statistics of the 21st century. The expansion of our digital communication is necessary if we want to remain the leading provider of statistical information about Germany. We say goodbye to the Statistical Yearbook, which stood for our activities for almost seven decades. The yearbook goes, but the data remains. They are already available via our online services in greater abundance than ever before. ….
One thing is clear: Rigid reference books are hardly in demand today. The trend is towards up-to-date, digitally available information. The information is researched online.”
Source: Press conference destatis, 30 October 2019. Original in German.

Digi…. ?

The rationale for abolishing printed yearbooks is always the same: digit(al)ization continues, users have new needs and go online.

The three D’s.

What is meant by digit(al)isation?

‘Digitization essentially refers to taking analog information and encoding it into zeroes and ones so that computers can store, process, and transmit such information. …
  We refer to digitalization as the way in which many domains of social life are restructured around digital communication and media infrastructures.”
Instead, … digital transformation … refers to the customer-driven strategic business transformation that requires cross-cutting organizational change as well as the implementation of digital technologies.

In the final analysis, therefore, we digitize information, we digitalize processes and roles that make up the operations of a business, and we digitally transform the business and its strategy. Each one is necessary but not sufficient for the next, and most importantly, digitization and digitalization are essentially about technology, but digital transformation is not. Digital transformation is about the customer.

Source: Forbes

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Digital alternatives

There is no doubt that the Internet as a source of information is a priority, the first step does not go to the bookshelf, but digitally, to the smartphone, tablet or PC.
Digitization has taken place, everything is available in binary form.
And also digitalization in the form of digital types of information and communication: There are comprehensive websites of statistical institutions, some with more, some with less sensitive user guidance. And there are many interactive databases of these institutions, too.
When users get to these sources, they await some work to find their way around, searching databases, before a table, a file or a simple website appears on the (often too small) screen.

Table-based yearbooks

After the end of the German Statistical Yearbook, there is a comprehensive alternative offer for the content: More tables, graphs and methodological explanations can be found on the web – with a little more effort, not concentrated. it’s like leaving a small, manageable town and having to find your way around a big city. And it is no longer a physically tangible object, guaranteed to be accessible over a long period and no longer – as a book can be – a visible showpiece and image carrier of the institution.

Statistisches Jahrbuch Deutschland 2019

Yearbooks with stories to tell

A specialty of traditional yearbooks is their texts. They offer a certain kind of storytelling. This is quite demanding because it is more than just boring retelling of table contents and it must not get involved in controversial or even politically colored explanations. Describing the context in the various thematic areas and pointing out remarkable developments make them stand out. They help to get a quick first orientation in the extensive data.

Here are a few examples of such storytelling yearbooks and how they – whether discontinued or not – have responded to the trend to digit(al)ization.

Canada till 2012

The Canadian Statistical Yearbook was an early standard for yearbooks that wanted to present a country and its international position in an attractive and widely understandable form.
‘Presented in almanac style, the 2012 Canada Year Book contains more than 500 pages of tables, charts and succinct analytical articles on every major area of Statistics Canada’s expertise. The Canada Year Book is the premier reference on the social and economic life of Canada and its citizens.
This publication has been discontinued as of April 2013. The last issue of this publication was November 2012.The Canada Year Book 2006 to 2012 is available online in html and pdf formats.’

After some changes, it was closed in 2013. There is no digital alternative, unless – similar to the German solution – there is a thematically ordered overview of data, analyses, and references

Netherlands

The Dutch statistical yearbook was early converted from a printed to a PDF version. Abolished under the title Yearbook, but then continued as Trends in the Netherlands in 2014.

Yearbook 2014

The yearbook went, ‘Trends in the Netherlands’ came – even with more storytelling than before. To be found on the homepage.

Trends in the Netherlands 2019

Switzerland

The Swiss Statistical Yearbook is one of the last international editions still to be printed. And it is a comprehensive, multimedia, thematically organized reference work: infographics, extensive texts, tables, references in two languages and abstracts in two other languages make it widely accessible.

Digitalization has not passed this yearbook by either. Older editions can be consulted on the Office’s website and the text of the current yearbook is included as an introductory panorama in each of the thematic pages on the web.

Thematic homepage

The Panorama: An excerpt from the current printed yearbook, format pdf:

Panorama: Textual introduction

Eurostat

Most existing yearbooks entered the era of digit(al)ization entirely through file lists and interactive databases or through PDF versions. Eurostat has been going the other way for several years. The idea of a storytelling book functioning as a unit has been implemented digitally from the very beginning. And last but not least, with an educational intention that promotes statistical literacy. This edition is therefore also called Statistics Explained.

In each topic, this website finally leads to the all-embracing world of digital data and databases.

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What else …. ?

Statistical yearbooks encounter digit(al)ization in very different ways: they disappear into (interactive) databases on the web, survive as PDF editions (more or less well integrated into websites) or celebrate a kind of resurrection in web-based book-like products.
The strengths of yearbooks (especially those based on storytelling) are thus more or less lost: For example, a professionally curated, guaranteed reliable, easily usable and explained introduction to the essential data topics in one place and guaranteed to be available for many years to come. And an ever more extensive and better presented world of data on the Internet has emerged. An accessible wealth of information, of which one could hardly dream a few years ago.

But no matter how developed this data offer may be, it still lacks some simplicity and quick access to the right data. Anyone who has ever searched for data on different topics and over different periods knows how frustrating this can be. Which in the mass of partly similar files is the right one? How can various topics be combined in databases? How can the different time series be combined?
Is it the right data for the question asked, can I use it without risk? Perhaps there are nuances in the method or definition of the data and they should not be compared with other data?

But often users don’t even come to the official sources, because the most common change in user behavior is googling. And the result may be a single figure or a large amount of links to very different sources

… digital transformation.

Statistical institutions are making great efforts in the field of digital innovation, as shown not least by the sometimes very attractive offerings. Many are working on so-called experimental statistics: Coding data faster and better with the help of artificial intelligence, creating and extracting indicators from big data and much more. All this should make the production of statistical data more efficient, less dependent on human intervention (and human error) and faster. In the field of data dissemination, such experiments are still lacking, at least to this day.

Are all these innovations the often mentioned digital transformation?
At best, they are elements of it.

What digital transformation can users dream of?
Perhaps that statistical information is produced in a rapid and uninterrupted process (like in a pipeline) and is provided with semantic information in such a way that a simple search over topics and periods delivers an unambiguous result and refers to important context information. That even in a digital transformation human intervention will still be necessary (at the latest in presentation, explanation, and support), is not a paradox: Perhaps the overall package of digital transformation also includes non-digital elements, dedicated print products that skilfully lead into the digital world.

Two Years Ago

He was a pioneer and a great inspiration for what public statistics always strives for: more visibility, more understanding and more resonance. Two years ago Hans Rosling (27 July 1948 – 7 February 2017) died too young.

Demanding and enriching was an encounter with Hans Rosling. His demand for public statistics was urgent and a prerequisite for his enlightening work: that statistical data should be open to all. Here he saw successes. It was and is enriching how he conveyed these data combined with a message. With innovative, precise, entertaining and always very personal presentations, he clarified what had happened and what developments could be desired. He was a realist regarding his effectiveness and yet always an optimist ….. better: a “possibilist”. What remains for me is how he taught to see with numbers – a constant challenge for public statistics.

“One little humble advice” he gave to his audience at the end of a presentation in 2013:

On BBC 2013

Full presentation here:  
 DON'T PANIC — Hans Rosling showing the facts about population 

It Goes On

Gapminder (“a fact tank, not a think tank”), with its innovative tools and commitment, continues to live with Anna Rosling Rönnlund and Ola Rosling.

And recently Factfulness, a book by the three (Hans Rosling, Anna Rosling Rönnlund, Ola Rosling) has been published with the subtitle “Ten Reasons We’re Wrong About The World – And Why Things Are Better Than You Think”

“Factfulness: The stress-reducing habit of only carrying opinions for which you have strong supporting facts. “

Heroes of Slovenia

My colleagues published the Slovene multi-player statistical quiz app on Tuesday 22nd. I love it!

We’ve all heard “statistics is boring”, but once you add lovely design, humorous content and a strategic game to it, it can be fun. In two days after the announcement there are more than 1200 players who already played abt. 24.000 games. And we know a lot more about Slovenia than we knew three days ago 😉

How the game works: First one selects his player name, then a favourite character (a hero from Slovenia), turns the wheel of fortune (automatic selection of the region one plays for) and then looks for an opponent (a region or a player). Each game has 7 questions, the last one always being a number range slider (statistical data). The one who wins gets some resources and so each region gradually evolves from the prehistory to the future. The competiton of the 12 regions lasts for 7 days, then the game resets to the starting point (keeping the overall score board of players).

In the current version we have about 2000 questions, 500 of these are statistical (others include interesting info about local peculiarities, history, literature, language, geography …).

At the moment there is the Slovene version only, but the App is ready to be translated or adjusted for another country (if adjusting you’d have to invest also into some graphic design adjustments). I sincerely hope we’d make an English version of the Slovene game someday, for our foreign visitors or fans of Slovenia 😉

Website announcement:  https://lnkd.in/gg3byB9

Game website: http://junaki-slovenije.si/

FB page: https://www.facebook.com/JunakiSlovenije

Developer: http://proxima.si/sl/project/junaki-slovenije

 

 

Statistical Self-Defense

No day without numbers in (social) media, in everyday life. And they not only want to inform us, they also want to orient us in one direction or the other.

And every day are among them deliberately or unintentionally false or misleading numbers.

Therefore, statistics must arm themselves against incorrect use of data and repeatedly teach the correct handling of statistical data.

There have long been numerous works on this subject. Here is another quite basic presentation by the Dutch journalist Sanne Blauw.

She picks out five statistical sins.

• 

• 

• 

• 

The fact that such presentations often use numbers themselves, which would also have to be viewed critically, does not diminish the value of her warnings.

What are they doing …. ?

… and how do statistical institutions present what they do?

In times of fake news and austerity measures, statistical offices are feeling more and more the urge to orientate the public about themselves and the usefulness and necessity of trustworthy statistics.

But how to proceed?

Public relations specialists know countless ways to get messages to the target groups. A traditional and usually quite boring way are annual reports. They’re usually just an obligatory thing and treated accordingly.

Annual reports as ambassadors for public statistics

Is this still a quite boring lecture under the changing circumstances mentioned above? Let’s look at a few examples.

 

#1 European Official Statistics

The European Statistical Governance Advisory Board publishes the report, which focuses on fake news and trust issues. It’s  mainly a control report with recommendations to be re-evaluated next year.

Not everyone’s reading but with some interesting facts about the European statistical infrastructure.

‘ … this year’s Report focuses on the importance of good governance to maintain and increase trust in official statistics, ensuring appropriate access to administrative and privately-held data, and the practical challenges of coordinating NSSs.

Chapter 1 looks first at the challenge of maintaining and enhancing trust in official statistics when there is conflicting information provided by non-official sources or when statistical indicators fail to relate to citizens’ actual experiences. Access to administrative records and privately-held data is then examined, highlighting some of the difficulties encountered by NSIs and the need to ensure that the transposition of the new Regulation on General Data Protection into national law does not hinder access to data for statistical purposes. Finally, the challenge of coordination within NSSs is discussed, particularly in relation to ONAs.

Chapter 2 provides ESGAB’s overview of the implementation of the Code of Practice, ..

Chapter 3 reviews ESGAB’s activities over its first nine years, … ‘ (p.10)

‘

p.8

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Glossary

European Statistics

Code of Practice (‘the Code’)

The European Statistics Code of Practice sets

the standards for developing, producing and

disseminating European statistics. It builds on

a common definition of quality in statistics used

in the European Statistical System, composed of

national statistical authorities and Eurostat. ….

European Statistical Governance

Advisory Board (ESGAB, ‘the Board’)

ESGAB provides an independent overview of

the implementation of the Code of Practice. It

seeks to enhance the professional independence,

integrity and accountability of the European

Statistical System, key elements of the Code,

and the quality of European statistics …..

European Statistical System (ESS)

The European Statistical System is a

partnership between the European Union’s

statistical authority, i.e. the Commission

(Eurostat), the National Statistical Institutes

(NSIs) and Other National Authorities (ONAs) ….

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Some interesting facts given in this report:

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#2 UK

UK is of a similar type to the EU. Somewhat more systematic, with clear performance targets and evaluated indicators …. and tons of financial data.

‘This year has been a challenging one for those of us working in official statistics. Numbers were very much in the news in the run-up to the EU referendum and since. Examples of bad use of numbers and misrepresentation of statistics can cast a shadow over the validity and integrity of evidence. However, information that can be accepted and used with confidence is essential to good decision making by governments, businesses and individuals.’ …’ (John Pullinger,p.4)

‘The 2007 Act requires that the Authority produces a report annually to Parliament and the devolved legislatures on what it has done during the year, what it has found during the year and what it intends to do during the next financial year. This report fulfills that responsibility.’ (p.9)

‘STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES

To achieve its mission, over five years the Authority will focus on five perspectives:

a helpful, professional, innovative, efficient and capable statistical service will, we believe, serve the public good and help our nation make better decisions.’ (p.9)

.

‘KEY PERFORMANCE INDICATORS

The Authority’s Business Plan includes a number of Performance Metrics through which we monitor performance. Our performance against these indicators is summarised in the table below. It is important to note our targets are always used to stretch performance ..’ (p. 9)

And some interesting facts:

 

#3 Sweden

Sweden reports concisely on a few central goals and with the obligatory information on the organisation and infrastructure.

‘Statistics Sweden plays a key role in public infrastructure. Its task is to develop, produce and disseminate official and other government statistics. The Official Statistics Act sets out a number of criteria concerning statistical quality, in which statistical relevance is a top priority.’ (Joakim Stymne, p. 4)

‘Punctuality in publishing remained high and amounted to 99 percent. No corrections that were considered serious were made to the published statistics during the year, and there were fewer internal error reports than in 2016.’ (p. 7)

‘During 2017, Statistics Sweden has studied how its customers and users view the agency and its products in different ways.’ (p. 10)

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#4 Switzerland

Switzerland differs from other reports in two ways:
– The report shows not only the activities of the Office, but also the state of the country according to various topics (the milestones of the multi-annual statistical programme, and at the same time a small Statistical Yearbook).
– And it is very personal, responsible persons behind the statistics become visible.

German and French only

‘Die erste Halbzeit der Legislatur ist um und damit auch die ersten zwei Jahre des statistischen Mehrjahresprogramms 2016–2019. Die darin festgelegten Ziele und Schwerpunkte bilden die Leitlinien für die Arbeit der Bundesstatistik. Die für das Jahr 2017 geplanten Meilensteine konnten erfolgreich umgesetzt werden. … … der Auftrag der Bundesstatistik wie folgt zusammengefasst: «Im Zentrum des Auftrags der Bundesstatistik stehen die Erstellung und die Vermittlung von nutzergerechten Informationen zu wichtigen Lebensbereichen unserer Gesellschaft. Diese Informationen dienen unter anderem der Planung und Steuerung zentraler Politikbereiche, deren Stand und Entwicklung mit Hilfe der statistischen Informationen beobachtet und beurteilt werden können.” (Georges-Simon Ulrich, p.5)

The state of statistics in the topic areas: e.g. Population

And the targets for the future: focal points and priority developments in the coming year:

Some interesting facts about structure and publishing

Staff

Publishing

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# 5 Germany

Germany is taking a quite different approach: the annual report is more like a scientific magazine. With interviews and contributions to focal topics.

‘ People are being guided more by their emotions and less and less by facts – this is how we might sum up the post-truth debate which reached its hitherto climax last year, culminating in “postfaktisch” (post-factual, or post-truth) being chosen as the German Word of the Year 2016. …

I hope that all of the other topics dealt with in this report provide you with a good insight into all matters figure-related and that, in so doing, we can enhance your trust and confidence in official statistics.’ (Dieter Sarreither, p.3).

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The table of contents shows how this report is designed as a magazine

.

Some interesting information about the office

.

This report also gives itself a personal touch and shows the responsible management personnel

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# Conclusion

Annual reports are certainly not the most effective way of informing the public about the activities and importance of statistical institutions. They must be approached with other measures; they must be embedded in PR measures. Then they can – especially if they are well made – contribute a lot to understanding official statistics.

 

 

 

 

 

Easy-to-understand Statistics for the Public

In a recently published EUROSTAT publication, the authors demand innovative forms of communication from public statistics in order not to lose their socially important role. Among other things, they demand ‘…. to tell stories close to the people; to create communities around specific themes; to develop among citizens the ability to read the data and understand what is behind the statistical process.’

Telling Stories

The UNECE hackathon that has just been completed responds to this challenge.
‘A hackathon is an intensive problem-solving event. In this case, the focus is on statistical content and effective communication. The teams will be challenged to “Create a user-oriented product that tells a story about the younger population”. During the Hackathon, fifteen teams from nine countries had 64.5 hours to create a product that tells a story about the younger population. The teams were multidisciplinary – with members from statistical offices and other government departments. The product created should be innovative, engaging, and targeted towards the general public (that is, not specialists). There was no limit on the form of the product, but the teams had to include a mandatory SDG indicator in the product.
The mandatory indicator was “Proportion of youth (aged 15-24 years) not in education, employment or training” SDG indicator (Indicator 8.6.1).‘ (Source)

Winners

And the hackathon shows impressive results, even if only a few organisations have participated.

The four winners are:

My Favourites

My favourites are number 3 from the National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI-Mexico) and number 2 from the Central Statistical Office of Poland.

Why?

The Mexican solution…

…is aesthetically pleasing and easy to use. The interaction is left to the user and can be individually controlled by him/her in the speed.

The diagrams do not stand alone, but are explained by short texts while scrolling.

The results are not just being accepted. Rather, the concepts are explained and questioned – statistics are presented with the methodological background.

The Polish solution…

…starts with a jourmalistic approach. Here too, the interactivity can be controlled by the user at the desired speed.

At the end, the authors also seek direct contact with the users; a quiz personalizes the statistical data and gives an individual assessment of where the users stand personally with regard to these statistics.

Success Factors

The two applications mentioned above combine decisive user-friendly features:
– visually attractive,
– easy-to-understand navigation that can be controlled by the user according to his needs,
– the journalistic approach,
– concise and instructive explanations,
– personalization,
– hints on the methodological background.

Many of the other applications show the frequently encountered weaknesses: Too much information should be provided, no courage to leave something behind and concentrate on the most important elements. And this leads to long texts and complex navigation with the effect that users quit quickly.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Communication of statistics in times of fake news

In a recent paper Emanuele Baldacci, (Director, Eurostat) and Felicia Pelagalli, (President, InnovaFiducia) deal with the ‘challenges for official statistics of changes in the information market spurred by network technology, data revolution and changes in information consumers’ behaviours’ (p.3)

Three scenarios

The status-quo or bad scenario:

‘Information will continue to be consumed via multiple decentralized channels, with new information intermediaries emerging through social platforms, digital opinion leaders, technologies that reinforce belonging to peers with similar profiles and backgrounds, including in terms of beliefs.’  … ‘Under this scenario it is likely that increased competition from alternative data providers will put pressure on the official statistics position in the information ecosystem and lead to drastic reduction of public resources invested in official statistics, as a result of the perceived lack of relevance.’ (p.8)

 

The ugly scenario:

‘Big oligopoly giants will emerge by integrating technologies, data and content and providing these to a variety of smaller scale platforms and information intermediaries, with limited pricing power for further dissemination. In this scenario, data generated by sensors and machines connected to the network will increasingly create smart information for individuals. However, individuals will not participate in the data processing task, but will be mostly confined to crowdsourcing data for digital platforms and using information services.’
‘In this scenario, official statistics will be further marginalized and its very existence could be put in jeopardy. More importantly, no public authority with significant influence could be in charge of assessing the quality of data used in the information markets. Statistics as a public good may be curtailed and limited to a narrow set of dimensions. …  Official statisticians will appear as old dinosaurs on the way to extinction, separated from the data ecosystem by a huge technology and capability gap.’ (p.9)

 

The good scenario:

The authors do not stop here. They also see a good scenario, but a scenario that implies a huge engagement.

This scenario is ‘predicated on two major assumptions.
First, the information market will be increasingly competitive by sound regulations that prevent the emergence of dominant positions in countries and even more important across them.
Second, official statistics pursue a strong modernization to evolve towards the production of smart statistics, which fully leverage technology and new data sources while maintaining and enhancing the quality of the data provided to the public.
In this scenario, official statistics will generate new more sophisticated data analytics that cater to different users by tailored information services. It uses network technologies (e.g., blockchain, networks) to involve individuals, companies and institutions in the design, collection, processing and dissemination of statistics. It engages users with open collaborative tools and invests heavily in data literacy to ensure their usability. It strengthens skills and capacity on statistical communication to help users understand in transparent manners what are the strengths and limitations of official statistics.’ (p. 9/10)

 

Actions needed to face the challenges ahead

The good scenario already depicts some needed actions to be taken by official statisticians. The authors conclude with proposals that are not really new, ideas that have been on the table for some time but are not so easy to implement.

‘It is important to change mindsets and practices which have been established, in order to put in contact the citizens with official statistics, to make data accessible, to expand the understanding of their analysis, to support individuals, business and institutions in the decision-making process.

The key issue is how to be authoritative and to develop quality knowledge in the new and changing information market. It is important to know the rules and languages of the media platforms used for communication; to overcome the technicalities; to tell stories close to the people; to create communities around specific themes; to develop among citizens the ability to read the data and
understand what is behind the statistical process. In summary, put people at the center (overused phrase, but extremely valuable):
⎯ communicate statistics through engaging experiences and relevant to the people who benefit from them;
⎯ customize the content;
⎯ adopt “user analytics” to acquire the knowledge of the “users” through the analysis of data (web and social analytics) and the understanding of people’s interaction with the different platforms.’ (p.11)

And the concluding words call for external assistance:

‘It will be essential for statisticians to build more tailored data insight services and team up with communication experts to play a more proactive role in contrasting fake news, checking facts appropriately and building users’ capacity to harness the power of data.’ (p.12)

 

 

 

 

 

Corporate nieuws

Eurostat’s biennial scientific conference on New Techniques and Technologies for Statistics (NTTS) is over, a labyrinth of a website is online and tons of documents are somewhere published.

CBS Corporate nieuws summarizes the important trends discussed:
1) New data sources and the consequences
2) The importance of a proactive communication
3) Big Data and algorithms in official statistics

CBS, 06-06-2017 Miriam van der Sangen 

Corporate websites

Why taking this information just from CBS (the Dutch Statistical Office)? Because CBS Corporate nieuws is an excellent example of the second trend: proactive communication, proactivity in delivering (statistical) information to users. The website makes corporate information public and gives insights into activities of CBS and statistics. You see topics …

… and the people behind it.

The target public of this corporate website are enterprises, administrations, journalists, students and whoever may be interested.

A shorter English version is integrated into the CBS website.

Corporate websites like CBS’ are not quite usual. They are resource consuming but are probably very good in helping to understand statisticians’ mission and work .. and in motivating employees.

 

 

 

 

IMAODBC 2016: And the winner is…

The Best Presentation Award of the International Marketing and Output Database Conference IMAODBC 2016 in Gozd Martuljek, Slovenia goes to Susanne Hagenkort-Rieger and her team from DESTATIS (Statistisches Bundesamt, Germany).

In her presentation Susanne highlighted the importance of web search statistics  and why intuition when emphasizing selected statistical data is often not sufficient. To achieve relevance and accessibility of most popular statistical data we should not ignore what the web search data say.

Presentation is available at the IMAODBC 2016 website…

A few facts about IMAODBC 2016 as presented in the second best presentation by Corey Jenkins, USDA – Foreign Agricultural Service, U.S.A.:

 

 

Disrupting Dissemination – From Print to Bots

Digitally disrupted data production

“The collection of statistics has been digitally disrupted, along with everything else, and there are important questions about collection methods and whether or not “big data” genuinely offers promise for a giant leap forward in the productivity of official statistics.”

This statement in Financial Times’ edition of August 20th, 2015 deals with UK’s Office for National Statistics ONS. Its title:  “UK needs a statistical strategy to catch up with digital disruption”. Its message: ONS (and I think all Official Statistics) has problems to keep up “with the profound changes in the structure of the economy during recent decades.”

The “Independent Review of UK Economic Statistics” by Professor Sir Charles Bean, Professor of Economics at the London School of Economics in March 2016 goes deeper and gives 24 recommendations, some of these obviously valid for statistics’ production and producers in general.

“Innovation and technological change are the wellspring of economic advancement. The rapid and sustained rise in computing power, the digitisation of information and increased connectivity have together radically altered the way people conduct their lives today, both at work and play. These advances have also made possible new ways of exchanging goods and services, prompted the creation of new and disruptive business models, and made the location of economic activity more nebulous. This has generated a whole new range of challenges in measuring the economy.” (p.71)

“Measuring the economy has become even more challenging in recent times, in part as a consequence of the digital revolution. Quality improvements and product innovation have been especially rapid in the field of information technology. Not only are such quality improvements themselves difficult to measure, but they have also made possible completely new ways of exchanging and providing services. Disruptive business models, such as those of Spotify, Amazon Marketplace and Airbnb, are often not well-captured by established statistical methods, while the increased opportunities enabled by online connectivity and access to information provided through the internet have muddied the boundary between work and home production. Moreover, while measuring physical capital – machinery and structures – is hard enough, in the modern economy, intangible and unobservable knowledge-based assets have become increasingly important. Finally, businesses such as Google operate across national boundaries in ways that can render it difficult to allocate value added to particular countries in a meaningful fashion. Measuring the economy has never been harder.” (p. 3)

And: “Recommended Action 4: In conjunction with suitable partners in academia and the user community, ONS should establish a new centre of excellence for the analysis of emerging and future issues in measuring the modern economy.”  (p.118)

Disrupting Dissemination of Statistics

The rise of new technologies followed by new information behavior has also disrupted existing dissemination formats (from print to digital) and dissemination practices (from quasi-monopolistic to open and multiple).

A well-known example for disrupting dissemination is given by Wikipedia and its subject is Wikipedia itself:
“The free, online encyclopedia Wikipedia was a disruptive innovation that had a major impact on both the traditional, for-profit printed paper encyclopedia market (e.g., Encyclopedia Britannica) and the for-profit digital encyclopedia market (e.g.,Encarta). The English Wikipedia provides over 5 million articles for free; in contrast, a $1,000 set of Britannica volumes had 120,000 articles.” (Article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disruptive_innovation)

In fact, disruptive tendencies happen on both sides: in producing and in presenting or accessing statistical information.

Some thoughts about this:

1. Until the end of the 20th-century, print was the main channel for disseminating statistics. Libraries in Statistical Offices and Society had their very vital role.
2. With the internet opened a new channel: Statistical Offices’ Websites appeared, access to databases and attractive data presentation (visual, storytelling, see i.e. this) were top themes and stuff for long discussions. Access to data was now simple and for everyone.
3. With the open data initiatives not only accessing but also disseminating statistical information got much easier. Nearly everyone could become a data provider. License fees no longer hindered the redisseminaton of official statistics and APIs or webservices provided by statistical offices made this possible in an automated way.
   Statistics can be easily integrated into websites and apps of non-official data providers, this with all the chances to enable democratic conversation and the risks of data misuse.
4. All this gives statistics a much more important role in communication processes. On the other hand communicating with statistics gets simpler: Letters, telephone calls and even e-mails become cumbersome seen the possibility bots (will) provide. With a stats bot in my daily used messenger, I ask for a statistical information, and the bot uses a search engine or connects me directly to a statistical expert.
   “Brands that already have full-fledged apps and responsive websites can take advantage of bots’ ability to act as concierges, handling basic tasks and micro-interactions for users and then gracefully connecting users with apps or websites, as appropriate, for a more involved experience.” (Adam Fingerman, venturebeat, 20.7.2016)
5. What’s next? Innovation with disruption goes on, but disruption does not always mean destruction: It’s still a wise decision to keep some information in paper format. A statistical yearbook with key data lasts for centuries, not so a website, an API or a bot.

 

DigiPub

Mid-December 2014 Statistics Switzerland launched its first digital publication for tablets (iOs. Android) and (and!) browser, in French and German. The name for this publishing category is ‘DigiPub‘.

.

In App Store and Google Play

DigiPubs are provided via the SwissStats App available on Apple Store and Google Play (Windows to come later ).

..

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In the browser .

The challenge: Storytelling in times of tablets

Storytelling in the time of tablets and mobile people performs in a new field.
The idea and the message are old – let‘s call it the book paradigm.
But it‘s a book in new clothes. New aspects must be taken into account: new possibilities, skills, tools and processes.

 

.folio

After evaluation, the choice for a performant and sustainable publishing instrument fell on: .folio, an open format, part of Adobe‘s Digital Publishing Suite DPS.

.folio provides:

• Standardised navigation
• Wide range of presentation possibilities
• Integration of internet content
• Runs on most platforms, also browsers
• Publication in the major stores
• Production based on layout programs, editing systems or web content management systems
• Open format (ZIP archive with PDF, HTML, XML inside).

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 Rethink publication !

Electronic publication offers everything needed to make a story appealing. But this means: Rethink publication!

Authors and also publication specialists (publishers, visualisers, layout designers) are challenged

• in terms of concept with regard to the content that is to be communicated
• in terms of the presentation due to the possibilities that the medium is opening up
• in terms of collaboration with specialists.

New ways of working, processes and also changing job descriptions are the result and necessary.

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The Concept

The whole story about choosing and developing DigiPubs is in the following presentation:

Download presentation (format: Powerpoint): Dotfolio.pptx

Download presentation (format: PDF): dotfolio.pdf