SocialBlock_Decentralized user-centric data management applications in the context of smart cities
This paper proposes an architecture for decentralized user-centric data management applications for communications in smart cities. The solution proposed tackles some of the typical problems that affect centralized systems, related to the ownership, exploitation, management, and storage of data. A proof-of concept is presented, which demonstrates the feasibility of the proposal on an empirical basis. The proof-of-concept is implemented using Ethereum and IPFS as key tools.
“COVID Community Data Lab” is a research project focused on the analysis of data that can support an equitable recovery amid the 2020 pandemic in the US context. The project gathers and analyses data from creative sources and exposes the inequalities that Boston communities face as a result of COVID19.
This paper suggests a shift of focus in the development of digital initiatives from city to society, towards the cultivation of smart social urbanism. The authors explore “smart urbanism” in ten cities of Israel, analysing them in terms of participation, democratisation and innovative urbanism. They suggest that most municipalities are still at an early stage of digitization implementation and have the ability to shape and form a vision for the cities as socio-technological ecosystems in an equitable manner. 
The book “Open Cities|Open Data: Collaborative Cities in the Information Era” consists of a collection of papers that synthesise two emerging topics: smart cities and open data. While the academic, policy and market discussions about ‘Smart Cities’ have been underway for over a decade, the chapters and research in this collection reflect a more recent re-framing of the discussion around the ‘data-driven and responsive city’. 
The ETSI Human Factors Technical Committee has released ETSI TR 103 455, a Technical Report that assesses citizen-related issues that smart city-related standardization in the ICT domain needs to address. The present document is based on the recognition of local communities as users of standards rather than participants, and highlights the importance of addressing their needs within standardisation documentation. The issues that are being addressed include accessibility, usability, interoperability, personal data protection and security, among others. The study gives an overview of existing ETSI and other SDOs standards in that field, including ETSI community indicators. It also aligns with the UN Sustainable Development Goal 11 “Make cities inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable”.
This research is based on the synthesis of outcomes from different use cases of the sharing economy, such as room sharing, car sharing and fashion sharing. The purpose of this article is to evaluate the main drivers of the sharing economy through an exhaustive weighting and meta-analysis of previous relevant quantitative research articles, obtained using a systematic literature review methodology.