Crowdsourcing

THE POWER OF CROWDS

Do you still remember the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge that has been spreading rapidly through all form of social networking sites? The challenge has raised over $100 million for the ALS Association in a month. (Smith, 2014) It serves as an excellent example of crowdsourcing, which encourages the public to financially support this campaign. According to Goodrich, “Crowdsourcing is a term used to describe the process of getting work or funding from a large group of people in an online setting. The basic concept behind this term is to use a large group of people for their skills, ideas and participation to generate content or help facilitate the creation of content or products.” (Goodrich, 2013) What made this movement so successful that all the people around the world are crazy about it?

Figure 1: Dinius, M. (2014). On the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge and Ferguson. [online] Avidly.
Available at: http://avidly.lareviewofbooks.org/2014/08/21/on-the-als-ice-bucket-challenge-and-ferguson/ 

Tuchman claims that celebrity endorsements play an important role in compelling other people to participate in this awareness. (Washkuch, 2014) Some famous individuals currently own millions of followers and fans on their Facebook Pages, and Youtube videos that have been seen by millions of people worldwide. All these celebrities are using social networking sites to increase their popularity and influence.  (Gordhamer, 2009) Phua describes that the celebrities with a large number of followers have the ability to be influential endorsers, by extending their status and popularity in the society. (Moreno, 2014) It shows the power of crowdsourcing that can spread an idea from person to person across all different kinds of social media in a short period of time.

Social media brings us together and closer.  It has changed the way we communicate and interact with other individuals and the world around us. The other example that I want to show you here is about crowdsource design. I am an active user of freelancer.com where a crowdsourcing site more focused on design. People can get good quality work at a very low budget by posting what they want, how much they are willing to pay and the deadline of the project. Gasca describes that crowdsourcing is “the practice of outsourcing ideas, services or content by soliciting contributions from a large group of people, or more specifically, an online community rather than through traditional employees or service providers.” (Gasca, 2014)

Video 1: Citizen journalism: Paul Lewis at TEDxThessaloniki. (2014). [image] 

Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9APO9_yNbcg&channel=TEDxTalks

In this generation, we have advanced mobile technology that allows us to take photos, watch videos, search information, socialize on social networks and communicate with one another by using a mobile devices. According to a reporter, Lewis demonstrates that “When every cellphone can record video and take pictures, everyone is a potential news source” (Lewis, 2014) Social media are increasingly becoming people’s trusted sources of information. It spreads the information faster than any other media as the users can share their opinions, links, photos, videos and more. In addition, there are three million people join crowdsourcing satellite hunt for missing Malaysia Airlines plane, which is organised by DigitalGlobe. A crowdsourcing platform called Tomnod is created which allows the public efforts in the search. (South China Morning Post, 2014)

Video 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwgI3C2N2Ww&channel=bontvchina. (2014). [video] BON TV China - Blue Ocean Network.

In conclusion, crowdsourcing brings a lot of advantages to our life. It helps to provide accurate information in the data journalism by analysing the data, reports and the publication. (Bradshaw, 2014)

REFERENCES:

Image:

Dinius, M. (2014). On the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge and Ferguson. [online] Avidly. Available at: http://avidly.lareviewofbooks.org/2014/08/21/on-the-als-ice-bucket-challenge-and-ferguson/ [Accessed 11 Dec. 2014].

Information:

Smith, R. (2014). The Science Behind The Success Of The ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. [online] Forbes. Available at: http://www.forbes.com/sites/ricksmith/2014/09/01/the-science-behind-the-success-of-the-ice-bucket-challenge/ [Accessed 23 Nov. 2014].

Goodrich, R. (2013). What is Crowdsourcing?. [online] BusinessNewsDaily.com. Available at: http://www.businessnewsdaily.com/4025-what-is-crowdsourcing.html [Accessed 23 Nov. 2014].

Washkuch, F. (2014). ALS Association considers next move post-Ice Bucket Challenge. [online] Prweek.com. Available at: http://www.prweek.com/article/1312427/als-association-considers-next-move-post-ice-bucket-challenge [Accessed 23 Nov. 2014].

Moreno, S. (2014). UGA researcher studies celebrities' Twitter influence on brand marketing. [online] Grady.uga.edu. Available at: http://grady.uga.edu/news/view/uga_researcher_studies_celebrities_twitter_influence_on_brand_marketing#.VHFhSlWsUlQ [Accessed 23 Nov. 2014].

Gordhamer, S. (2009). 5 Ways Social Media is Changing Our Daily Lives. [online] Mashable. Available at: http://mashable.com/2009/10/16/social-media-changing-lives/ [Accessed 23 Nov. 2014].

Gasca, P. (2014). Need a New Design? 5 Reasons to Crowdsource It.. [online] Entrepreneur. Available at: http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/236179 [Accessed 23 Nov. 2014].

Lewis, P. (2014). Crowdsourcing the news. [online] Ted.com. Available at: http://www.ted.com/talks/paul_lewis_crowdsourcing_the_news [Accessed 23 Nov. 2014].

South China Morning Post, (2014). Three million people join crowdsourcing satellite hunt for missing Malaysia Airlines jet. [online] Available at: http://www.scmp.com/news/asia/article/1451444/three-million-people-join-crowdsourcing-satellite-hunt-missing-malaysia [Accessed 23 Nov. 2014].

Bradshaw, P. (2014). crowdsourcing | Online Journalism Blog. [online] Onlinejournalismblog.com. Available at: http://onlinejournalismblog.com/tag/crowdsourcing/ [Accessed 23 Nov. 2014].

Videos:

Citizen journalism: Paul Lewis at TEDxThessaloniki. (2014). [image] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9APO9_yNbcg&channel=TEDxTalks [Accessed 23 Nov. 2014].

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwgI3C2N2Ww&channel=bontvchina. (2014). [video] BON TV China - Blue Ocean Network.