Invited workshop for the Humanities Research Center at Rice University, 7 March 2016.
This workshop will provide an overview of crowdsourcing in cultural heritage and consider the ethics and motivations for participation. International case studies will be discussed to provide real life illustrations of design tips and to inspire creative thinking.
4. Hands up!
• Do you work with:
– Text
– Images
– Audio/video
– Objects
– Stories / memories / knowledge?
• Does your mission include education,
outreach or engagement?
• Does you work with volunteers? Students?
6. Crowdsourcing in cultural heritage
Asking the public to help with tasks that
contribute to a shared, significant goal or
research interest related to cultural heritage
collections or knowledge.
The activities and/or goals should be inherently
rewarding.
8. Crowdsourcing and related terms
• User-generated content
• Human computation
• Citizen science, citizen history, citizen
humanities
• Academic (e.g. humanities) crowdsourcing
• Community-sourcing, nichesourcing
• Cognitive surplus
• 'the wisdom of crowds'
9. • 19th Century natural history
collecting
• 1849 Smithsonian weather
observation project
• 1857, 1879 Oxford English
Dictionary appeals
• WWII Soldiers given a Field
Collector's Manual in Natural
History by the US Museum of
Natural History
James Murray, editor, OED, with contributor slips
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:James-Murray.jpg
Crowdsourcing before the web
21. Exercise: compare front pages
Go to: http://tinyurl.com/TryCrowdsourcing
Compare pairs of sites: how good is the front
page at making you want to participate in a
project?
41. Who participates in crowdsourcing?
• People who are passionate about your subject
/ people who like doing the task you're
offering
• Super-volunteers and lots of other people
• Amateurs, professionals, 'pro-ams'
• People who can't volunteer in regular hours or
at your venues
43. Motivations for participation
• Altruistic
– helping to provide an accurate record of local
history
• Intrinsic
– reading 18thC handwriting is an enjoyable puzzle
or they're interested in the subject
• Extrinsic
– an academic collecting a quote from a primary
source
45. Intrinsic motivations for participation
• fun
• the pleasure in doing
hobbies
• the enjoyment in
learning
• mastering new skills,
practicing existing skills
• recognition
• community
• passion for the subject
State Library of Queensland, Australia
https://secure.flickr.com/photos/statelibraryqueensland/3198305152/
46. Motivations and Galaxy Zoo
I am interested in astronomy 46%
I enjoy looking at the beautiful galaxy images 16
I can meet other people with similar interests 6
I am excited to contribute to original scientific research 22
I can look at galaxies that few people have seen before 8
I had a lot of fun categorising the galaxies 11
I am happy to help 7
I find the site and forums helpful in learning about astronomy 10
I am interested in science 4
I find Galaxy Zoo to be a useful resource for teaching other people 2
I am amazed by the vast scale of the universe 24
I am interested in the Galaxy Zoo project 8
Crowdsourcing Cultural Heritage with Mia Ridge and Ben Brumfield at HILT
47. Motivations and Your Paintings Tagger
I am interested in paintings 85.5%
I like working with people with similar interests 12.3
I am excited to be contributing to research into paintings 60.8
I can look at paintings that few people have seen before 50.5
I have fun categorising the paintings 55
I am happy to help with a national project like Your Paintings 76.3
I find Tagger helpful in learning about paintings 45.6
I find Tagger to be a useful resource for teaching other people 15.7
I am impressed by the wide range of the national collection of paintings 51.5
Crowdsourcing Cultural Heritage with Mia Ridge and Ben Brumfield at HILT
48. Motivations as design guide
People crave:
• satisfying work to do
• the experience of
being good at
something
• time spent with people
we like
• the chance to be a part
of something bigger
(Jane McGonigal, 2009)
51. Exercise: try projects
Go to: http://tinyurl.com/TryCrowdsourcing
How clear was the purpose of the project?
• Were the steps to complete the task clear?
• How enjoyable was the task?
• Did the reward (if any) feel appropriate?
• Did you notice any friction or barriers?
• Did the site anticipate your questions about
the tasks?
52. Concepts for reviewing projects
• The 'call to action'
– Is the first step toward participating obvious?
– Is the type of task, source material and output obvious?
• Probable audience
– Can you tell who the project wants to reach?
– Does text trigger their motivations for starting, continuing?
– How are they rewarded?
– Are there any barriers to their participation?
• Data input and data produced
– What kinds of tasks create that data?
– How are contributions validated?
• How productive, successful overall?
55. Interface design for crowdsourcing
• Demonstrate a close match between the
crowdsourcing project and the mission of the
organisation running it
• Show, don't tell - let people see the impact of
their contributions
• 'Validate procrastination' - give people an
altruistic excuse to spend time on your tasks
57. Interface design for crowdsourcing
• Design for 'super taggers' and for people who
do just one or two tasks
• Design different tasks for different contexts
59. Designing for motivation
• Match 'microcopy' messages to motivations
• Match tasks and rewards to motivations
• Anticipate which motivations might change
over course of a project
60. Simple tasks as stepping stones
http://www.fossilfinder.org/
61. Designing for on-going participation
• Support increasing mastery
• Promote participants to new skills, new roles
within project
• Support emergence of a community
63. Design for participation
• Make it easy for people to do the right thing
• Scaffold the experience: tightly defined tasks,
reduce uncertainty about quality of
contribution, provide feedback on progress
64. Design for 'flow'
• Clear sense of goals
• Feedback on progress towards goals
• Skills matched to challenge
• Attention focused
on task
• 'in the moment'
• Not worried
about external
factors
65. Exercise: lessons from game design
Go to http://git.io/2048
Spend 2 minutes trying it out
66. Did you understand what to do?
Did you want to keep playing?
Moral: start with the simplest task possible
Exercise: lessons from game design
67. Inspiration from casual games
• Easy-to-learn game-play
• Simple controls
• 'Forgiving' game-play with low risk of failure
• Carefully managed complexity levels with a
shallow learning curve, guidance through
early levels, and inclusive, accessible themes
• Sense of rapid progress and achievement
68. Inspiration from casual games
• Build any tests for skill or experience
requirements into the interface
• Build tutorials for new skills into application at
the point where its needed; provide good
feedback on actions
70. Project design
• Plan to store and process results from
crowdsourcing
• Allow time for community interaction and
marketing
• Design projects that contribute to your
engagement strategy and digitisation goals
• Release early and often (if you can)
• Reality check your plans
71. Marketing and outreach
• Call to action and tagline should explain
what's unique about your project
• Start with what people already love and share
about your collections
• Updates as outreach
– Achievements, progress towards goals
– Highlight participant discoveries, questions
75. Exercise: planning crowdsourcing
• Who already loves and/or uses your collections?
• What motivates them? What rewards can you
design to match their motivations?
• Which material needs what kind of work?
• Do any existing platforms meet most of your
needs?
• What potential barriers could you turn into tasks?
• How will you resource community interaction?
• How would a project support your mission,
engagement strategy and digitisation goals?
76. Thank you!
Mia Ridge @mia_out
Digital Curator, British Library
Knowledge Exchange Event & MGS Digital Transformation
Network meeting, 2 December 2, 2015
The Kelvingrove Art Gallery & Museum