Get the Crowd Going – An Empirical Analysis toward a Crowdsourcing Engagement Model

Crowdsourcing continues to attract attention from researchers, organizations, and policy makers alike. In particular, crowdsourcing projects that engage intrinsically motivated volunteers and are aimed at endeavors such as policy making, research, and social activism, need to understand how to create sustained engagement in their initiatives. A fair amount of research has been done on identifying users’ motivation in crowdsourcing. However, crowdsourcing motivation literature still lacks sufficient theory-driven approaches. In this paper, we derive from theory of work motivation, the technology acceptance model, and the gamification concept to propose a model that can explain participants’ motivation in crowdsourcing. To measure our model constructs, we conducted a survey on the users of a European crowdsourcing project, researching truck traffic tracking. The results of the exploratory factor analysis confirm that our constructs can be measured properly using our questionnaire. At the end of this paper, we explain our findings and the contribution of our study

The Right to City in the Era of Crowdsourcing

This article explores the meaning and context of crowdsourcing at the municipal scale. In order to legitimately govern, local governments seek feedback and engagement from actors and bodies beyond the state. At the same time, crowdsourcing efforts are increasingly being adopted by entities – public and private – to digitally transform local services and processes. But how do we know what the “the right to the city” (RTTC) means when it comes to meaningful and participatory decision-making? And how do we know if participatory efforts called crowdsourcing—a practice articulated in a 2006 Wired article in the context of the tech sector—when policy ideas are sought at the municipal scale? Grounded in the ideals of Henri Lefebvre’s RTTC, the article brings together typologies of public participation to advance a conceptualization of ‘crowdsourcing’ specific to local governance. Applying this approach to a smart city initiative in Toronto, Canada, I argue that for crowdsourcing to be taken seriously as a means of inclusive and participatory decision-making that seeks to advance the RTTC, it must have connection to governance mechanisms that aim to integrate public perspectives into policy decisions. Where crowdsourcing is disconnected to decision-making processes, it is simply lip service, not meaningful participation

Police Knowledge Exchange: Full Report 2018

[Executive Summary] This report was commissioned to explore the enablers and barriers to sharing within and between police forces and between police forces and partners, including the public. This was completed from an interdisciplinary review of international literature covering sharing, knowledge exchange, learning and organisational learning. The literature broke down into four main factors; who, why, what and how. An introduction to the literature is presented with ‘Who’ is sharing which considers both personal identity and different institutional issues. The ‘Why’ literature covers issues of cultural and community motivators and barriers. The ‘What’ segment reviews concepts of data, information and knowledge and related legislative issues. Finally, the ‘how’ section spans face to face sharing approaches to technologies that produce both enablers and barriers. A series of 42 in-depth interviews and focus groups were completed and combined with 47 survey responses . The aim of the interviews, focus groups and survey was to show perceptions and beliefs around knowledge sharing from a small sample across policing in order to complement the findings from the literature review. The survey was adapted from a standardised questionnaire (Biggs, 1987). The Biggs questionnaire focused on what motivated students to learn and how they approached their learning. Our adapted survey looked at what motivated police to share, and how they approached sharing. The responses showed a trend, across the police, towards a motivation for sharing to develop a deeper understanding of issues. However, the approaches and the strategies they used to share with others, which were primarily driven by achieving and surface approaches (to get promoted and get the job done). According to Biggs (1987) this could leave them discontented as they never progress to a deeper understanding of issues. Scaffolding sharing within the police through processes that are clearly defined, effective and valued could help to overcome these issues. Within the interviews and focus group findings a similar structured approach to sharing was adopted. Within the ‘who’ section some key aspects around personal relationships, reciprocity and reputation were identified. The ‘why’ the police share was one of the largest discussion points. Not only was there a deep motivation to solve key policing issues there was an approach of reciprocity. Police sharing was deeply motivated to support ‘good practice’ in the prevention and detection of crime. However, a sharing barrier was identified in the parity of value given to different types of knowledge for example between professional judgement and research evidence knowledge. Sharing was achieved when there were reciprocal benefits, in particular with personal networks or face to face sharing which was noted as ‘safe’. Again, this was inhibited by misunderstandings around the ‘risks’ of sharing, frequently attributed to data protection legislation; producing cautious reactions and as an avoidance tactic to save time and effort sharing. However, a divide was noted between technical users and those who avoided any online systems for sharing; often due to poorly designed systems and a lack of confidence in how to use systems. The police culture was identified as being risk-adverse, and competitive due to multiple factors, a lack of supported time to share, Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC) reviews and promotion criteria. The result was perceived to be a poor cultural ability to learn from mistakes and a likelihood to repeat errors. A set of strategic recommendations are given and include the use of a sharing authorised professional practice for HMIC reviews, sharing networks and training. A further set of operational recommendations are given such as; sharing impact cases for evidence based practice, data sharing officers and evaluating mechanisms for sharing. This full report is supported by the Police Knowledge Exchange Summary Report 2018 which gives an overview of the findings and recommendations

Derivative Works 2.0: Reconsidering Transformative Use in the Age of Crowdsourced Creation

Apple invites us to “Rip. Mix. Burn.” while Sony exhorts us to “make.believe.” Digital service providers enable us to create new forms of derivative work—work based substantially on one or more preexisting works. But can we, in a carefree and creative spirit, remix music, movies, and television shows without fear of copyright infringement liability? Despite the exponential growth of remixing technologies, content holders continue to benefit from the vagaries of copyright law. There are no clear principles to determine whether any given remix will infringe one or more copyrights. Thus, rights holders can easily and plausibly threaten infringement suits and potentially chill much creative activity. This Article examines the impact of copyright doctrine on remixes with an emphasis on crowdsourced projects. Such an analysis is particularly salient at this juncture because consumers are neither as passive nor as isolated as they once were. Specifically, large-scale crowdsourced projects raise issues relating to copyright and fair use on a scope and scale never before imaginable. As such, this Article reflects on the particular problems raised by the growth of crowdsourced projects and how our copyright regime can best address them. We conclude that future legal developments will require a thoughtful and sophisticated balance to facilitate free speech, artistic expression, and commercial profit. To this end, we suggest a number of options for legal reform, including: (1) reworking the strict liability basis of copyright infringement for noncommercial works, (2) tempering damages awards for noncommercial or innocent infringement, (3) creating an “intermediate liability” regime that gives courts a middle ground between infringement and fair use, (4) developing clearer ex ante guidelines for fair use, and (5) reworking the statutory definition of “derivative work” to exclude noncommercial remixing activities

Digital Democracy : The Tools Transforming Political Engagement

This paper shares lessons from Nesta's research into some of the pioneering innovations in digital democracy which are taking place across Europe and beyond.Key findings:Digital democracy is a broad concept and not easy to define. The paper provides a granular approach to help encompass its various activities and methods (our 'typology of digital democracy').Many initiatives exist simply as an app, or web page, driven by what the technology can do, rather than by what the need is.Lessons from global case studies describe how digital tools are being used to engage communities in more meaningful political participation, and how they are improving the quality and legitimacy of decision-making.Digital democracy is still young. Projects must embed better methods for evaluation of their goals if the field is to grow

Spatial and Temporal Sentiment Analysis of Twitter data

The public have used Twitter world wide for expressing opinions. This study focuses on spatio-temporal variation of georeferenced Tweets’ sentiment polarity, with a view to understanding how opinions evolve on Twitter over space and time and across communities of users. More specifically, the question this study tested is whether sentiment polarity on Twitter exhibits specific time-location patterns. The aim of the study is to investigate the spatial and temporal distribution of georeferenced Twitter sentiment polarity within the area of 1 km buffer around the Curtin Bentley campus boundary in Perth, Western Australia. Tweets posted in campus were assigned into six spatial zones and four time zones. A sentiment analysis was then conducted for each zone using the sentiment analyser tool in the Starlight Visual Information System software. The Feature Manipulation Engine was employed to convert non-spatial files into spatial and temporal feature class. The spatial and temporal distribution of Twitter sentiment polarity patterns over space and time was mapped using Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Some interesting results were identified. For example, the highest percentage of positive Tweets occurred in the social science area, while science and engineering and dormitory areas had the highest percentage of negative postings. The number of negative Tweets increases in the library and science and engineering areas as the end of the semester approaches, reaching a peak around an exam period, while the percentage of negative Tweets drops at the end of the semester in the entertainment and sport and dormitory area. This study will provide some insights into understanding students and staff ’s sentiment variation on Twitter, which could be useful for university teaching and learning management

Digital Vigilantism as Weaponisation of Visibility

This paper considers an emerging practice whereby citizen’s use of ubiquitous and domesticated technologies enable a parallel form of criminal justice. Here, weaponised visibility supersedes police intervention as an appropriate response. Digital vigilantism is a user-led violation of privacy that not only transcends online/offline distinctions but also complicates relations of visibility and control between police and the public. This paper develops a theoretically nuanced and empirically grounded understanding of digital vigilantism in order to advance a research agenda in this area of study. In addition to literature on vigilantism and citizen-led violence, this paper draws from key works in surveillance (Haggerty and Ericsson, British Journal of Sociology, 51, 605–622, 2000) as well as visibility studies (Brighenti 2007; Goldsmith, British Journal of Criminology, 50(5), 914–934, 2010) in order to situate how digital media affordances and cultures inform both the moral and organisational dimensions of digital vigilantism. Digital vigilantism is a process where citizens are collectively offended by other citizen activity, and coordinate retaliation on mobile devices and social platforms. The offending acts range from mild breaches of social protocol to terrorist acts and participation in riots. The vigilantism includes, but is not limited to a ‘naming and shaming’ type of visibility, where the target’s home address, work details and other highly sensitive details are published on a public site (‘doxing’), followed by online as well as embodied harassment. The visibility produced through digital vigilantism is unwanted (the target is typically not soliciting publicity), intense (content like text, photos and videos can circulate to millions of users within a few days) and enduring (the vigilantism campaign may be top search item linked to the target, and even become a cultural reference). Such campaigns also further a merging of digital and physical spaces through the reproduction of localised and nationalist identities (through ‘us/them’ distinctions) on global digital platforms as an impetus for privacy violations and breaches of fundamental rights