Open AccessTowards open government through open source software for web analytics: The case of Matomo
Author(s) -
Jonas Gamalielsson,
Björn Lundell,
Simon Butler,
Christoffer Brax,
Tomas Persson,
Anders Mattsson,
Tomas Gustavsson,
Jonas Feist,
Erik Lönroth
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
ejournal of edemocracy and open government
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.135
H-Index - 1
ISSN - 2075-9517
DOI - 10.29379/jedem.v13i2.650
Subject(s) - web analytics , analytics , world wide web , software analytics , web application , government (linguistics) , open source , big data , computer science , software , data science , web development , business , web intelligence , the internet , software development , component based software engineering , linguistics , philosophy , programming language , operating system
Web analytics technologies provide opportunities for organisations to obtain information about users visiting their websites in order to understand and optimise web usage. Use of such technologies often leads to issues related to data privacy and potential lock-in to specific suppliers and proprietary technologies. Use of open source software (OSS) for web analytics can create conditions for avoiding issues related to data privacy and lock-in, and thereby provides opportunities for a long-term sustainable solution for organisations both in the public and private sectors. The paper characterises use of and engagement with OSS projects for web analytics. Specifically, we contribute a characterisation of use of OSS licensed web analytics technologies in Swedish government authorities, and a characterisation of organisational engagement with the Matomo OSS project for web analytics.