Investigating Transparency and Accountability of User Interfaces for Data Visualization: A Case Study on Crowdfunding

摘要

Crowdfunding is an innovative form of fund raising that enables individuals and businesses to leverage a large audience of potential supporters for financing their projects: disseminating the message to many potential contributors compensates for the smaller individual commitment. In the recent years, thanks to web-based platforms, crowdfunding received increasing attention and branched into several subtypes, such as, reward-based and equity-based initiatives, which enable supporters to pre-buy products or acquire company shares, respectively. Indeed, crowdfunding platforms have several advantages (e.g., reducing barriers to bottom up initiatives and democratizing access to high-return investments). Simultaneously, as governments are in their early stage of addressing the many risks and grey areas related to the dynamics of crowdfunding, the accountability of platforms has a crucial role. In this paper, we investigate the transparency of the User Interface (UI) of equity crowd-funding platforms and we discuss the implications in enabling users to make better informed decisions about their investments.