Aggregating a Policy Dataset We set out to identify and gather, structure, and organize as many local government data sharing policy documents as we could. Here’s how we went about it.
Focusing the Scope Although urban platforms include companies outside of the sharing economy, the sharing economy is the sector most associated with platform urbanism and has received the bulk of regulatory attention from cities and other local government agencies. I therefore decided to limit my policy gathering search to local government data mandates focused on sharing economy platforms. This meant searching for policies targeting the three most prominently regulated sharing economy types: •
Ride hail platforms like Uber and Lyft,
•
Short term rental platforms like Airbnb and VRBO and
•
Micromobility platforms like Bird and Lime
For purposes of consistency of language and national government context, and to avoid expanding my search outside my own geography of expertise, I also decided to focus my search on local government agencies in the United States but to remain flexible about including international data sharing mandate examples as they arose.
44
Towards Urban Data Commons? On the Origins and Significance of Platform Data Sharing Mandates