Basic Input Data for Audiences’ Geotargeting by Destinations’ Partial Accessibility: Notes from Slovakia

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This is a great paper on a data-mashup about tourism. It sets a nice example and I am sure the techniques will be useful for others. Based on that I have a few remarks. Good luck with this great project!!

1. the abstract and intro do not make it clear what the objective of the tsudy is. Is it the results (i think no), the mthods (i hope so), or simply the data?

2. Code and data is not shared corectly. The ithub repo looks very much underdeveloped and incomplete. For Data this must be perfect. Also all scripts which produced all graphics must be there. 

3. Is this really a communications article? Not a data descriptor? 

4. The english is good but often ungrammatical. It is a pity, as it dimiinishes your impact.

Author Response

This is a great paper on a data-mashup about tourism. It sets a nice example and I am sure the techniques will be useful for others. Based on that I have a few remarks. Good luck with this great project!!

Dear Sir or Madam,

I'm very grateful for the encouragement, as well as for all remarks.

1. the abstract and intro do not make it clear what the objective of the study is. Is it the results (i think no), the mthods (i hope so), or simply the data?

Well, honestly all three of them, but yes the abstract and intro were quite ambiguous. Therefore both were updated.

2. Code and data is not shared corectly. The ithub repo looks very much underdeveloped and incomplete. For Data this must be perfect. Also all scripts which produced all graphics must be there. 

The GitHub repo was updated with a corresponding description of all data extractors (main folder), and harmonization/exporting scripts (folder ExportDataLayers). The source of the graphic dashboard with the corresponding .json dump may be found in the webData folder. For practical reasons, all exported data layers may be found in the ExportDataLayers/graphData folder in .xlsx format.

2. Is this really a communications article? Not a data descriptor? 

If correctly understood, according to the Journal’s instructions for Authors, a Data descriptor should focus on a (one) dataset. Since the notes (communication) focus on several data sources that produce several data layers, I would be grateful if it could stay as Communication of Notes.

3. The english is good but often ungrammatical. It is a pity, as it dimiinishes your impact.

Honest apologies. Major efforts were made to correct identified typos and mistakes.

Thank you again

Sincerely

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear authors,

thank you very much for an interesting research note. I like your approach, however, the text has some shortcomings.

First of all, I miss a clear aim of the paper. If it is just about visualization of data, the paper does not bring new knowledge. I would recommend to focus more on comparing the traditional data sources (e.g. from statistical office) with the online sources and to find if there is a correlation among the data.

Regarding the structure of the paper, it is a little bit unusual. Why is the part "Basic results" before "Material and methods"? Moreover, it is strange to cite in first two paragraphs only one study. I also miss the link between the information sources and activities of DMOs in online space in the Introduction. The Basic results are hard to read. With no clear aim in mind I cannot see why have you analyse the markets in detail.

On the other hand, the main strength of the paper is the methodology and how you obtained the data. You should focus more on the possibility to collect data (open data, using APIs or web scraping) in tourism.

Anyway, I like your attitude and hope that these recommendations will strengthen the paper.

Author Response

Dear authors,

• thank you very much for an interesting research note. I like your approach, however, the text has some shortcomings.

Dear Sir or Madam,

Thank you very much for your input and advice.

• First of all, I miss a clear aim of the paper. If it is just about visualization of data, the paper does not bring new knowledge. I would recommend to focus more on comparing the traditional data sources (e.g. from statistical office) with the online sources and to find if there is a correlation among the data.

Yes, the Introduction and Abstract were quite ambiguous indeed. For this, they were updated. As for the identification of Correlations between traditional data sources (Official statistics on Occupancy) and less conventional data (Share of the web a social media content interaction by accessibility). Correlation coefficients and Coefficients of Determination were computed only for Slovakia. Mainly because of missing monthly data aggregated at city level that could be correctly geocoded for most of the sampled foreign markets.  E. g. a foreign market does have Impressions at city level for a given month, but the city nomenclature is not geocodable (Google Analytics and FB system errors), thus the input for the correlation equations would be fake NULL values.

• Regarding the structure of the paper, it is a little bit unusual. Why is the part "Basic results" before "Material and methods"?

Although I agree that the manuscript’s structure is unusual, it follows the Journal’s instructions [https://www.mdpi.com/journal/data/instructions] and the structure of the Journal’s recommended template [https://www.mdpi.com/files/word-templates/data-template.dot].

• Moreover, it is strange to cite in first two paragraphs only one study. I also miss the link between the information sources and activities of DMOs in online space in the Introduction.

The whole section has been updated.

• The Basic results are hard to read. With no clear aim in mind I cannot see why have you analyse the markets in detail.

The section has been updated. The markets were analyzed in detail as a test run of the resulting layers, and because the sampled markets are among the most important for the tested destination.

• On the other hand, the main strength of the paper is the methodology and how you obtained the data. You should focus more on the possibility to collect data (open data, using APIs or web scraping) in tourism.

Thank you for the advice. The manuscript was updated, with more focus on data collection ant transformation techniques.

• Anyway, I like your attitude and hope that these recommendations will strengthen the paper.

Thank you again, I do believe they did strengthen the manuscript.

Sincerely

Reviewer 3 Report

Dear Authors,

every scientific article, including this one, should follow the writing rule, which is to start with an introduction, followed by the theoretical background, materials and methods, research results, discussion and conclusion. Also, in the discussion of the results, there is no place for tables. Please adjust the work according to these rules.

Author Response

Dear Sir or Madam,

Although I agree that the manuscript’s structure is unusual, it follows the Journal’s instructions [https://www.mdpi.com/journal/data/instructions] and the structure of the Journal’s recommended template [https://www.mdpi.com/files/word-templates/data-template.dot]. Looking at other published manuscripts in Data, I sincerely believe that the implemented structure of the Journal’s template is by the Journal’s rules of writing.

Table 1 and Table 2 were excluded from the Discussion section and referenced as sources.

Thank you

Sincerely