Post on 22-Jan-2023
Developing MicroPasts
CAA, 24 April 2014
Chiara Bonacchi
UCL Institute of Archaeology
with Andrew Bevan (UCL) Daniel Pett (British Museum)
Adi Keinan-Schoonbaert (UCL)
Crowd-sourcing in archaeology
• Crowd-sourcing as – the practice of seeking information, services or funds in small chunks from
large groups of people, over the internet (definitions discussed in Dunn and Hedges 2012)
• Increasingly explored for supporting public audiences’ interaction with archaeology – Participation in research – Participation in micro-financing
Crowd-sourcing projects
• Diverse range: – Inspecting imagery for
archaeological features – Transcribing papyri – Interrogating built architecture – Public recording of metal
finds…
Crowd-funding projects
• Ranging from excavations to dissertations
• Using existing or new dedicated platforms
• Varying degrees of success
Observations
• Mainly contributory models • Little evaluation done
Contributory
Collaborative
Co-creative
Hosted
Models for participation: Public Participation in Scientific Research Project, further elaborated on by Simon
Introducing MicroPasts
• A collaboration between UCL and the British Museum
• Funded by the AHRC, Digital transformations in community research co-production
Aim
• To develop and test an online space where mixed groups of archaeological enthusiasts collaborate to:
- produce innovative open datasets via crowd-sourcing (e.g. CC0, CC-BY) - develop new research projects into archaeology, history and heritage (sometimes involving crowd-sourcing)
- micro-fund those new collaborative projects via crowd-funding
Help cataloguing
• 30,000 index cards of all known Bronze Age metal artefact finds in the UK from 1800 to 1983
Help creating 3D models
• 3D SfM models of palstaves recorded in the British Museum Bronze Age Index (Photoscan)
Component 2: community forumcommunity.micropasts.org
• Discourse (https://github.com/discourse/discourse)
• For research and platform co-design
Component 3: crowd-funding platform
• Neighbor.ly (https://github.com/neighborly/neighborly)
• Catarse (https://github.com/catarse/catarse)
• Micro-funding of projects co-designed via the forum or externally
• 3 seed projects initially – London’s Lost Waterway – Mapping waterway sites, and
transcribing relevant documents
Evaluation: aims
• How do online communities of interest in the human past form and develop through the MicroPasts platforms?
• How do different contributors engage with archaeology and the past via the MicroPasts platforms, through time, and what is the value of that engagement for community members including institutions?
• What is the sustainability of the MicroPasts platforms, and the applicability of a similar model in other countries?
Evaluation: methodology
• Approach – Quantitative / qualitative – Focus on MP platforms and
social media / ‘control cases’ amongst target audiences
– Online / offline – Link info on: contributors’
profile, opinions, behaviour; data produced; their re-use
– Taking time into account
• Methods (at different stages) – Online surveys – Talks / meet-ups – Google analytics – Pybossa statistics – Diary study – Social media data analysis
(cultural interests and practices) – Text analysis and SNA
Coming from… • Entry survey on completion of
first crowd-sourcing task – ‘Circles’, whether works with
archaeology / history as part of main job, age, email
• Forum, Google analytics, Pybossa statistics
(Very!) initial data: 16-23 April
Suggesting that… • Community building:
– 195 registered members – UK and US focus – 55% of respondents not
working in archaeology / history
– 24% within our immediate network
• Engagement: – Photo masking: prevalent
‘entry’ application – Transcription: fewer people,
but the most dedicated ones • Number of tasks • Anonymous contributors:
23-35% on transcription, 53% on masking
– Need for more guidance / visualisation
(Very!) initial data: 16-23 April
Next steps
• Guidance and purposiveness – [3D model viewer] – Information on the Bronze Age
Index / British prehistory / 3D modelling
– Development of badges • Tasks
– Transcription of ‘discovery cards’
• Crowd-funding platform
Challenges
• Time in relation to the complexity of the platform – Long development times and
little space for front-end evaluation
– Need to co-design the platform as we go along / challenge of not losing users in the process
• Planning an evaluation that – Does not disrupt people’s
engagement – Is discrete but open and
ethically compliant
• Being ready to adapt the evaluation plan in response to people’s interaction while maintaining coherence
• Adoption of new funding practices within a university environment (crowd-funding)