Category: citizen science

Opportunity: come and help us create the ExCiteS Social Enterprise!

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The Extreme Citizen Science group, set up about 8 years ago, has developed two main technological infrastructures – Sapelli software to allow data collection by low-literacy participants, and GeoKey, a data management system for community mapping. We have also developed an engagement approach that allows for the co-production of the data collection process, and for … Continue reading Opportunity: come and help us create the ExCiteS Social Enterprise!

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citizen science, Extreme Citizen Science, GIS, Social Enterprise, social entrepreneurship, UCL KT

10 years of Mapping for Change

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November 24 marks 10 years since Louise Francs, Chris Church and myself set up Mapping for Change. It’s a proud moment when the social enterprise that was set out of a research project at UCL is now well established, and the work that it does is mentioned in the annual report of the Chief Medical … Continue reading 10 years of Mapping for Change

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citizen science, Extreme Citizen Science, mapping for change, Mapping for Sustainable Communities, PPGIS, Social Enterprise, social entrepreneurship, Usability, VGI

Citizen Science: Expertise, Democracy and Public Participation – Report for Swiss Science Council

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One of the joys of the Doing it Together Science project is that it provides opportunities to work closely with different partners from very different areas. One such a collaboration is with Bruno Strasser and his group at the University of Geneva who are researching citizen science from an STS/history of science perspective. Over the … Continue reading Citizen Science: Expertise, Democracy and Public Participation – Report for Swiss Science Council

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citizen science, Expertise, Papers, policy, Research projects, SSC, Swiss Science Council, VGI

New publication: Participatory citizen science

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I’ve mentioned in the previous posts about the introduction and conclusions chapters in the book “Citizen Science: Innovation in Open Science, Society and Policy” and the chapter about citizen science in universities. The final chapter in the book that I would like to highlight is my chapter “participatory citizen science“. As Rick Bonney pointed to me, on the face … Continue reading New publication: Participatory citizen science

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#ECSA2016, Book, Chapter, citizen science, Environmental information, Extreme Citizen Science, ladder of participation, participation, participatory action research, PPGIS, Research projects, VGI

New publication: Integrating citizen science into university

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In addition to the introduction and conclusion chapters in the book “Citizen Science: Innovation in Open Science, Society and Policy“, I have contributed to content chapters that are at the body of the book. Daniel Wyler, from the University of Zurich, led on the writing of the chapter “Integrating citizen science into university” and I … Continue reading New publication: Integrating citizen science into university

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Book, Chapter, citizen science, Papers, universities

New publication: Citizen science to foster innovation in open science, society and policy

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The previous post described the opening chapter of “Citizen Science: Innovation in Open Policy, Science and Society“, which apart from the first 7 pages, is following a fairly standard pattern of introduction chapters – an overview of the sections and explaining the logic behind organising the chapters and the order that they appear, and description … Continue reading New publication: Citizen science to foster innovation in open science, society and policy

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#ECSA2016, Book, citizen science, innovation, Open Science, Papers, policy

New publication: Innovation in open science, society and policy – setting the agenda for citizen science

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As part of the editorial team of the book “Citizen Science: Innovation in Open Policy, Science and Society“, I have contributed by working with the authors of chapters, organising the orders of the chapters, managing the peer review process, and so on. In addition, I was involved in the writing to 4 chapters out of … Continue reading New publication: Innovation in open science, society and policy – setting the agenda for citizen science

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Book, Chapter, citizen science, innovation, Papers, policy, VGI

Five online training modules on citizen science

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At the beginning of the year, as part of my work at UCL and together with members of the Extreme Citizen Science group, I launched a new postgraduate level course “Introduction to Citizen Science and Scientific Crowdsourcing“. We have opened it for distance learners on the UCL eXtend platform. As a postgraduate course, it required … Continue reading Five online training modules on citizen science

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citizen science, online course, OPENER, teaching, VGI

UCL Sustainability week – a global university that is also Sommers Town local university

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UCL is marking its sustainability week between 29th October and 4th November. As part of the activities to mark the Green UCL initiative. I was interviewed to this video, together with other researchers and professional staff who are committed to integrating sustainability into their work. The video was shot around UCL and the nearby area. … Continue reading UCL Sustainability week – a global university that is also Sommers Town local university

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citizen science, Environmental information, Green UCL, Misc, sustainability, Sustainable development, UCL

Nature article on citizen science: mixing typologies

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About a week ago, the journal Nature published a feature article about Citizen Science No “PhDs needed: how citizen science is transforming research“, with the subtitle: “Projects that recruit the public are getting more ambitious and diverse, but the field faces some growing pains.” The report was written by the science journalist Aisling Irwin who contacted me, among … Continue reading Nature article on citizen science: mixing typologies

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citizen science, Misc, nature, VGI

Social Innovation and Citizen Science in Shanghai & Shenzhen

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During the 22 to 29 October, I visited Shanghai & Shenzhen together with Michael Norton (CIVA), who organised the visit, and Liz Barry (Public Lab). This was a packed tour, with two all-day workshops that are dedicated to citizen science (one in Fudan University, Shanghai, and the other as part of the Asian Environmental Innovation … Continue reading Social Innovation and Citizen Science in Shanghai & Shenzhen

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China, citizen science, Conference, Environmental information, great firewall, public lab, Social Enterprise, social entrepreneurship, social innovation, teaching, VGI

Citizens Disrupt podcast on Extreme Citizen Science

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Around July, Linda Doyle got in touch with me, with a request for an interview for a mini-series of podcasts on citizen science as part of the Science Disrupt podcasts. The Science Disrupt series got plenty of interesting episodes – a mini-series on Responsible Science, DIY Bio, Crowdfunding research, and many other topics. The specific … Continue reading Citizens Disrupt podcast on Extreme Citizen Science

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citizen science, Extreme Citizen Science, interview, podcast

Communities of practice of citizen science – workshops, meetings, and conferences

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It’s now about two months since the intensive 10 days at the beginning of June, which included attending the workshop Science and Dissent, the ECSA conference, the follow-up COST Action on citizen science meeting, and the Ecsite conference. Shortly after, I  attended the UNECE 22nd Working Group of Parties to the Aarhus Convention. June ended … Continue reading Communities of practice of citizen science – workshops, meetings, and conferences

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citizen science, Community of Practice, Conference, CoP, ECSA, NERC, OPENER, VGI

Developing mobile applications for environmental and biodiversity citizen science: considerations and recommendations

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The first outcome of the December 2016 workshop on apps, platforms, and portals for citizen science projects was the open access paper “Defining principles for mobile apps and platforms development in citizen science“, which came out in October 2017. The workshop, which was organised by Soledad Luna and Ulrike Sturm from the Berlin Museum for Natural History, has … Continue reading Developing mobile applications for environmental and biodiversity citizen science: considerations and recommendations

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apps, citizen science, ECSA, GIS, GIS Usability, HCI, Human–computer interaction, mobile app, smartphone apps, Usability, VGI

Justice and the Digital symposium notes

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The Digital Geographies Research Group of the RGS-IBG held the annual symposium at the University of Sheffield, under the theme “Justice and the Digital”. These are partial notes from the day The symposium opening session focus on the important question “What’s Justice got to do with it?” Jeremy Crampton covered three issues – practices of surveillance in the context … Continue reading Justice and the Digital symposium notes

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citizen science, Concepts, Conference, DGWG, Digital divide, digital inclusion, GIS Usability, passive and assertive inclusion, RGS, VGI

Ecsite 2018 – Day 2: technology advocacy, evolution, citizen science in parody trial, and DITOs

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The second day of Ecsite 2018 included several interesting sessions (here is day 1) which includes a morning discussion about the role of science centres and museum in the public discussion of science and technology, a parody trial of citizen science, and a discussion on the nature of multi-country projects, where I gave a presentation … Continue reading Ecsite 2018 – Day 2: technology advocacy, evolution, citizen science in parody trial, and DITOs

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#Ecsite2018, citizen science, Conference, DITOs, ECSA, Science and Technology, science communication, TogetherScience

Ecsite 2018 conference – Day 1 afternoon: science shops, and the current practice and future of RRI

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The afternoon of the first day of Ecsite 2018 included two parallel sessions (the notes from the morning is available here) Science shops: participatory innovation, research and equity Bálint Balázs (ESSRG) – the ESSRG acting as an independent science shop in Hungary, and want to share their and other organisations experience in running science shops. … Continue reading Ecsite 2018 conference – Day 1 afternoon: science shops, and the current practice and future of RRI

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#Ecsite2018, citizen science, Conference, ECSITE, RRI, science communication, science shops

Ecsite 2018 conference – day 1 Morning: Opening speeches, and citizen science frontiers

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The Ecsite conference took place in Geneva from the 7 to the 9 June. It followed the ECSA conference (or more accurately, ECSA conference was set to coincide with Ecsite). The conference theme was “creative collisions”. The conference was opened by the director of Geneva’s Natural History Museum Jacques Ayer. Organising an Ecsite conference is a … Continue reading Ecsite 2018 conference – day 1 Morning: Opening speeches, and citizen science frontiers

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#Ecsite2018, citizen science, Conference, Environmental information, Science and Technology, science communication

Co-designing the Citizen Science Global Partnership

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The workshop on the Citizen Science Global Partnership (CSGP) – the workshop included people from US, Brazil, Equador, Australia, UK, France, Switzerland, Germany, and Austria, as well as UNESCO. A range of interests in terms of citizen science activities – from health to ecological observations. Martin Brocklehurst summarised where we are – in the UNEA3: there … Continue reading Co-designing the Citizen Science Global Partnership

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citizen science, Conference, CSGP, ECSA, Environmental information, global partnership, SDG, Sustainable development, UNEP, VGI

European Citizen Science Association (ECSA) 2018 Conference – day 2: Beyond the deficit model, inclusiveness, libraries, and

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The second and last day of the conference (day 1 is covered here) started early, with a keynote: “Science society continuum: From ‘deficit model’ to social demand on research – the reform of science in progress” Lionel Larqué, FR – [physicist and head the collaboration of education, civil society organisations, and science. Influenced partnerships between science … Continue reading European Citizen Science Association (ECSA) 2018 Conference – day 2: Beyond the deficit model, inclusiveness, libraries, and

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#ECSA2018, citizen science, Conference, Crowdsourcing, Environmental information, European Citizen Science Association, inclusiveness, OpenStreetMap, policy, Science and Technology, VGI

European Citizen Science Association (ECSA) 2018 conference – day 1: keynotes, education, and national & international programmes

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Notes from the European Citizen Science Association Conference in Geneva, 4-5 June. Welcome to the conference! Katrin Vohland, ECSA Vice Chair, (DE) – conferences started from volunteering by Science et Cité two years ago. ECSA has been growing through participation in projects, and this allows ECSA to do things such as the conference and other … Continue reading European Citizen Science Association (ECSA) 2018 conference – day 1: keynotes, education, and national & international programmes

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#ECSA2018, citizen science, Conference, Crowdsourcing, ECSA, European Citizen Science Association

Science & Dissent – Day 2 – Afternoon session, round table and conclusion

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The afternoon and concluding session of the workshop (here are part 1 and part 2) Making as Dissent: The Performance of Producing Pharmaceuticals in Biohacking (Gabriela A. Sanchez, University of Geneva, Switzerland) looking at laboratory protocol to develop insulin and the researchers want to use a 50 years protocol. The Open Insulin Project at the Counter … Continue reading Science & Dissent – Day 2 – Afternoon session, round table and conclusion

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#ECSA2018, #sciencedissent, Activism, citizen science, ECSA, Environmental information, Research projects, Science and Technology, STS

Science & Dissent – Day 2 – Morning session

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The second day of the workshop (day one here) started with The New Technocracy: Scientific Dissent and New Forms of American Governance (Kelly Moore, Loyola University, United States) what are the political conditions of scientists in the US and what are the reorganisation of epistemology and knowledge. Dissent and political reorganisation are dependent on the forms … Continue reading Science & Dissent – Day 2 – Morning session

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#ECSA2018, #sciencedissent, citizen science, Conference, Science and Technology, STS, VGI

Science & Dissent – Day 1

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The Science and Dissent workshop was held at the University of Geneva on 1st and 2nd June 2018, hosted by the Citizen Sciences group Welcome and Introduction – Bruno Strasser opened, pointing Why now? When Trump won the election, Bruno felt that “the age of populism is back” – and within is we need to ask what … Continue reading Science & Dissent – Day 1

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#ECSA2018, #sciencedissent, citizen science, Conference, Environmental information, science and tech, VGI

Identifying success factors in crowdsourced geographic information use in government

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A few weeks ago, the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR), published an update for the report from 2014 on the use of crowdsourced geographic information in government. The 2014 report was very successful – it has been downloaded almost 1,800 times from 41 countries around the world in about 3 years (with more … Continue reading Identifying success factors in crowdsourced geographic information use in government

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citizen science, crowdsourced geographic information, Crowdsourcing, GFDRR, GIS Usability, policy, PPGIS, QCA, Usability, VGI, Volunteered Geographic Information, World Bank

Geothink & Learn citizen science session

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The following recording is from the Geothink & Learn lunchtime webinar. The call for the event stated: “Should it be only people with graduate degree who make extraordinary scientific discoveries? Maybe not. Citizen scientists around the world have contributed to new discoveries in fields such as astronomy, biology, meteorology, geography, public health, and more. It … Continue reading Geothink & Learn citizen science session

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citizen science, Crowdsourcing, Geothink, GeoWeb, PPGIS, Research projects, VGI, Webinar

New paper: Innovation in Citizen Science – Perspectives on Science-Policy Advances

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From time to time, there are opportunities to become a co-author with a lot of people that you are very happy to be associated with – to demonstrate a shared piece of work that represents a common understanding. The participation in the first European Citizen Science Association conference in 2016 created such an opportunity, with a … Continue reading New paper: Innovation in Citizen Science – Perspectives on Science-Policy Advances

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#ECSA2016, citizen science, Conference, ECSA, European Citizen Science Association, Papers

Lessons learned from Volunteers Interactions with Geographic Citizen Science – Afternoon session

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The context of the workshop and the notes from the first part of the workshop is available here. The theme of the second part of the day was Interacting with geographical citizen science: lessons learned from urban environments Volunteer interactions with flood crowdsourcing platforms – Avi Baruch talk is based on a completed PhD on the aspects of volunteers … Continue reading Lessons learned from Volunteers Interactions with Geographic Citizen Science – Afternoon session

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#citsciapps, #citscihci, citizen science, Concepts, ECSA, Environmental information, Extreme Citizen Science, GeoHCI, GIS Usability, PPGIS, Usability, Usability testing, VGI

Lessons learned from Volunteers Interactions with Geographic Citizen Science – Morning session

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On the 27th April, UCL hosted a workshop on the “Lessons learned from Volunteers Interactions with Geographic Citizen Science“. The workshop description was as follows: “A decade ago, in 2007, Michael Goodchild defined volunteered geographic information (VGI) as ‘the widespread engagement of large numbers of private citizens, often with little in the way of formal … Continue reading Lessons learned from Volunteers Interactions with Geographic Citizen Science – Morning session

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#citsciapps, #citscihci, citizen science, Citizen Science apps, ECSA, Extreme Citizen Science, Geographical Information System, GIS Usability, HCI, HCI for sustainability, HCI4D, ICT4D, OpenStreetMap, PPGIS, Research projects, Usability, VGI

GSF-NESTI Open Science & Scientific Excellence workshop – researcher, participants, and institutional aspects

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The Global Science Forum – National Experts on Science and Technology Indicators (GSF-NESTI) Workshop on “Reconciling Scientific Excellence and Open Science” (for which you can see the full report here) asked the question “What do we want out of science and how can we incentivise and monitor these outputs?”. In particular, the objective of the … Continue reading GSF-NESTI Open Science & Scientific Excellence workshop – researcher, participants, and institutional aspects

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citizen science, Concepts, Conference, GSF-NESTI, Open Access, Open Data, Open Science, OpenStreetMap, Social Enterprise

OECD Open Science and Scientific Excellence Workshop – Paris

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The OECD organised and hosted a Global Science Forum (GSF) and National Experts on Science and Technology Indicators (NESTI) Workshop on  “Reconciling Scientific Excellence and Open Science: What do we want out of science and how can we incentivise and monitor these outputs?” (9 April, 2018, OECD). In agreement with the OECD Secretariat, the information … Continue reading OECD Open Science and Scientific Excellence Workshop – Paris

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citizen science, Extreme Citizen Science, OECD, Open Access, Open Data, Open Science, OpenStreetMap

Representation of the people in science: Women in civic and citizen science – event summary

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On the 19th March, as part of UCL activities to the that accompany the UCL Exhibition “Disruptors and Innovators: Journeys in gender equality at UCL”, we hosted a panel of talks on how to open up science and engineering to new audiences, especially the representation of women in science. The event was called “Representation of … Continue reading Representation of the people in science: Women in civic and citizen science – event summary

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citizen science, Civic participation, civic science, DITOs, Extreme Citizen Science, Research projects, TogetherScience

Learning from the Arava Long-Term Socio-Ecological Research workshop

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The Eilot region, near Eilat in Israel, is considered locally as a remote part of the Negev desert in Israel (it is about 3.5h drive from the population centres of Tel Aviv). It is an arid desert, with very sparse population – about 4000 people who live in communal settlements – mostly kibbutzim in an area … Continue reading Learning from the Arava Long-Term Socio-Ecological Research workshop

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citizen science, Ecology, Ecosystem services, LTER, LTSER, Open Science, OpenStreetMap

Participatory soundscape sensing – joint paper with Dr Chunming Li

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One of the lovely aspects of scientific research is its international dimension – the opportunity to collaborate with people from different places, cultures, and necessarily practices and points of view. During 2017, Dr Chnming Li, of the Institute of Urban Environment of the Chinese Academy of Science, was a visiting researcher in ExCiteS. Dr Li … Continue reading Participatory soundscape sensing – joint paper with Dr Chunming Li

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citizen science, Crowdsourcing, Environmental information, noise, Papers, participatory monitoring, Participatory Sensing, Public Participation, Research projects, VGI

DITOs, Doing It TOgether Science – introductory video

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The Doing It Together Science (DITOs) project is now in its 20th Month. It is a 3-year project, funded by the EU Horizon 2020 programme, that is aimed to increase awareness of and participation in citizen science across Europe and beyond. As such, it is focused on communication, coordination, and support of citizen science activities. Therefore, … Continue reading DITOs, Doing It TOgether Science – introductory video

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citizen science, DITOs, ECSA, EU, H2020, Research projects, VGI

Citizen Science & Scientific Crowdsourcing – week 5 – Data quality

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This week, in the “Introduction to Citizen Science & Scientific Crowdsourcing“, our focus was on data management, to complete the first part of the course (the second part starts in a week’s time since we have a mid-term “Reading Week” at UCL). The part that I’ve enjoyed most in developing was the segment that addresses … Continue reading Citizen Science & Scientific Crowdsourcing – week 5 – Data quality

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citizen science, data quality, Geographical Information Quality, online course, OpenStreetMap, PPGIS, quality assurance, Spatial Data Quality, teaching, VGI, Volunteered Geographic Information

Citizen Science for Observing and Understanding the Earth

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Since the end of 2015, I’ve been using the following mapping of citizen science activities in a range of talks: The purpose of this way of presentation is to provide a way to guide my audience through the landscape of citizen science (see examples on SlideShare). The reason that I came up with it, is … Continue reading Citizen Science for Observing and Understanding the Earth

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Chapter, citizen science, crowdsourced geographic information, Earth Obesrvation, Earth Science, GIS, Papers, PPGIS, VGI, volunteer computing, Volunteered Geographic Information

Citizen Science & Scientific Crowdsourcing – week 3 – Participation inequality

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One of the aspects that fascinates me about the nature of participation in citizen science and crowdsourcing is the nature of participation and in particular participation inequality. As I’ve noted last week, when you look at large scale systems, you expected to see it in them (so Google Local Guides is exhibiting 95:5:0.005 ratio). I knew … Continue reading Citizen Science & Scientific Crowdsourcing – week 3 – Participation inequality

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citizen science, course, MOOC, online course, participation, Participation Inequality, teaching, Usability, VGI

Citizen Science & Scientific Crowdsourcing – week 2 – Google Local Guides

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The first week of the “Introduction to Citizen Science and Scientific Crowdsourcing” course was dedicated to an introduction to the field of citizen science using the history, examples and typologies to demonstrate the breadth of the field. The second week was dedicated to the second half of the course name – crowdsourcing in general, and its … Continue reading Citizen Science & Scientific Crowdsourcing – week 2 – Google Local Guides

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citizen science, crowdsourced geographic information, Crowdsourcing, GIS, GIS Usability, Google, Google Maps, OpenStreetMap, teaching, Usability, VGI, Volunteered Geographic Information, Web 2.0

Launching a citizen science course – week 1

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Today, I gave the opening lectures of the new UCL course ‘Introduction to Citizen Science and Scientific Crowdsourcing‘. In a way, it was more work than I originally thought, but I also thought that I’m underestimating the effort – so it’s not completely unexpected. Although I am responsible for the first installation of Moodle, the … Continue reading Launching a citizen science course – week 1

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citizen cyberscience, citizen science, history of science, teaching, UCL, VGI
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