1. Statistics Explained progress report
Luxembourg,
Dissemination Working Group,
15-16 April 2010

2. Statistics Explained?
World first: Eurostat’s encyclopaedia of European statistics
Statistical articles analyzing & explaining data
Glossary defining all concepts and terms
Portal linking deeply to more data & metadata
For the general public, not specialists
Wikipedia look and structure
Open-source Mediawiki software
All Eurostat staff (870 people) may edit anything, but not outsiders (normally)
15-16 April 2010
Dissemination Working Group: Statistics Explained

3. Solving two problems Traditional publications
do not adequately reach new audiences on the Internet:
general public not inclined to go to statistics website,
using Google, Wikipedia etc. to find information,
quoting on discussion forums & blogs, sharing via mail, Facebook, Twitter, …;
use slow and cumbersome workflows, rendering content outdated already when finally published
15-16 April 2010
Dissemination Working Group: Statistics Explained

4. Progress and future plans
Expanding content
Technical developments
User response
Impact on workflows
Risks and threats
15-16 April 2010
Dissemination Working Group: Statistics Explained

5. Expanding content
Articles added continually, newly created or ‘recycled’
Eurostat’s glossary CODED being integrated
8000 items
trilingual de, en, fr
Statistical publications replaced by or produced from Statistics Explained articles (wiki input from contractors)
Some new and not foreseen uses
Static ‘Sigma’ magazine articles
Environmental Data Centres (with European Environment Agency)
Policy monitoring reports (continuous rather than (bi-)annual)
15-16 April 2010
Dissemination Working Group: Statistics Explained

6. Technical developments
Operational
Home page automatically updated
‘Real-time’ user statistics via Piwik
To be implemented soon
Rss-feeds and link to Eurostat Home/news
Additional buttons to share, blog, cite, etc
‘Enhanced’ Word-like editor for contributors
More efficient watch, track & validation tools
Better search
15-16 April 2010
Dissemination Working Group: Statistics Explained

7. User response High and growing visitor numbers
1.2 million page views since October 2009
Search engine ranking: the key to success!
Referring sites
Wikipedia, NSIs, discussion forums, media, universities, …
Presence in ‘social media’
Facebook, Twitter, …
“Awards”
15-16 April 2010
Dissemination Working Group: Statistics Explained

8. Impact on workflows ‘Copernican revolution’:
electronic first, paper/pdf after (if at all)
Duplicating paper publications
Sigma, Statistics in focus
Replacing paper publications no longer produced
European business (557 pages=>100 articles), Sustainable development monitoring report (302 pages=>11 articles)
Wiki work platform for producing publications
Yearbook pilot, objectives:
more flexible collaboration of all contributors
faster production, fresher data
15-16 April 2010
Dissemination Working Group: Statistics Explained

9. Risks and threats Be bold ! But wise … Insufficient resources
Maintaining quality is labour-intensive!
(broken links, errors, more recent data, clearer wording, …)
Too many rules
Contributors must not be discouraged by procedures!
Not enough rules
Clear set-up and rules must preserve overall coherence
Lack of management
Editor-in-chief with mandate to invite contributions, recommend best practices, impose rules
Be bold ! But wise …
15-16 April 2010
Dissemination Working Group: Statistics Explained