Crowdsourcing

Crowdsourcing is the action of acquirring work and information from a large group of people via the internet. This information can be obtained from social media and other forms of media throughout the internet. Crowdsourcing allows companies to work with people throughout the world and aquire a variety of different skills. crowdsourcing image

variations of crowdsourcing

Idea Generation: Seeking ideas and suggestions from the crowd to solve a problem or improve a product.

Microtasks: Breaking down a large task into smaller, manageable microtasks that can be distributed to a crowd.

Funding: Crowdfunding platforms, where a crowd financially supports projects, products, or causes.

ata Collection: Gathering and analyzing data through contributions from a large number of individuals.

Open Innovation: Involving external contributors in the innovation process of a company.

benefits of crowdsourcing

Crowdsourcing is cost efficent because it allows access to talented workers without the need for a traditional workforce. Also, projects and work can be completed in a lesser amount of time due to the many contributors. Finally, the diversity of contributors can lead to innovative ideas and solutions that may have not emerged in a traditional setting.

Example of crowdsourcing

A well-known example of crowdsourcing is the website Wikipedia. Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia where anybody can contribute and add information onto the site.

drawbacks of crowdsourcing

There might be complications when crowdsourcing such as difficulties in confidentiality and communication between the groups involved. There is also a slight chance of receiving low quality work if a collaborater misunderstands the project’s requirements.

Popcorn Hack

How can organizations optimize crowdsoucing while minimizing the drawbacks?

Citizen Science

  • Citizen Science is scientific research that the general population helps to conduct. Ordinary citizens, often non-scientists, help contribute data to research projects using computing devices.
  • Gives a wide range of people the ability to contribute to scientific studies which provides more diverse data.

    Popcorn Hack

    How do you believe participating in a citizen science project could enhance both scientific research and public engagement, and can you share any specific areas of scientific study where citizen science might make a significant impact in the future?

Homework

Question 1

Explain the concept of crowdsourcing. Provide examples of how it is commonly used in different fields.

  • Crowdsourcing is where you get information or data from a group of people on the internet.
    • At school, crowdsourcing is used by stats students to get data for their surveys
    • People that have injuries are asked to take a survey on their life before and after the injury
    • Video games ask their players to take a survey on what they think the game can improve on

Question 2

Discuss the benefits and challenges associated with crowdsourcing. How can organizations effectively harness the power of crowdsourcing while mitigating potential drawbacks?

  • The benefits of crowdsourcing are that you can get data from a certain group of people, and its usually for free. The challenges are that there can be miscommunication and low quality respones between the receiver and responder. Organizations can maximize the power of crowdsourcing by effectively communicating their requirements and including an incentive for the user to make them more engaged.

Question 3

Identify a real-world example of a successful crowdsourcing project. Explain the project, its goals, and the positive outcomes achieved through the collaboration of a large group of people.

  • A successful crowdsourcing project was when McDonald’s asked people to submit their ideas for new hamburgers. Basically, their goal was to get people to start thinking about McDonald’s and contribute to their business in a fun way which helped increase their revenue.

Question 4

Create a hypothetical scenario where crowdsourcing could be applied to solve a specific problem. Describe the problem, the type of contributions you would seek from the crowd, and the potential impact of implementing the crowdsourced solution.

  • Mr Moulton had a problem yesterday where he wanted to see how many of his students were Android users. He came to our class and found that there were exactly 4 people who used Androids in both classes. He solved his problem of trying to find an amount of people that used Android’s. He made people contribute by making it seem lighthearted and funny. This made it easy for people to raise their hand even though other people didn’t.