It provides programmers, developers, designers, and entrepreneurs with access to municipal data sets to build technological products that address civic issues affecting New York City.
The contest is part of a broader New York City effort to increase government transparency and encourage entrepreneurship.
One challenge that civic hacking competitions face is that “they rely on programmers to define problems, instead of citizens or even government itself.” [4] Hana Schank wrote of the 2011 contest that “the problem with the [2011] BigApps contest is that it leaves both user needs and likely user behavior out of the equation, instead beginning with an enormous data dump and asking developers to make something cool out of it”.
[5] Recognizing these challenges, the 2013 BigApps competition introduced specific problem briefs organized around five “BigIssues” related to issues affecting New York City: Jobs and Economic Mobility, Cleanweb: Energy, Environment, and Resilience, Healthy Living, and Lifelong Learning.
The competition also included events where organizations and City agencies versed in a “BigIssue” presented data sets and ideas to competitors.