You'll DESIGN, BUILD, and TEST your own crowdsourcing / social computing system.
This is a team-based, semester-long design project, in which you'll create an original social computing application on your own. You'll work in teams of four people. More information about each milestone will be added to this page. Here is the timeline and grading weights for each milestone:
Now that you've mastered the arts and skills of social computing, it's important that you apply what you learned to a problem you deeply care about. It's a great way to learn further, and potentially make impact.
We'll create an assignment in KLMS for each milestone.
For each milestone deadline, all members of your team will lose 10% for each late day. Submissions will be accepted until three days after the deadline. After then you'll get 0 on that assignment. Please note that late submissions for midterm and final presentations are not allowed.
You'll need to find teammates to work on an exciting project this semester. Each team should have 4 people by default. In exceptional cases we'll accept 3-person teams.
Here are three methods you can use:
Please fill out the design project sign-up form.
In a team, you'll identify a problem that you'd like to tackle with your project, and brainstorm approaches to solving the problem.
In your report, please answer the following questions:
One report per team. Your report should be submitted as a zip file. The main report should be written in Markdown (please use the .md extension). Storyboards should be scanned in png or jpg, and need to be in a directory called images. We're going to publish your reports on the course website. Submit your team's report on KLMS.
Now that you've identified an interesting problem, a set of concrete tasks you want to support, and a set of possible solutions, it's time to turn these into a convincing pitch!
You'll have 10 minutes to do the following:
After the pitch, you'll have two minutes for Q and A.
Note #1: We'll enforce a strict 10-minute time limit by cutting off the presentation. Please plan and rehearse.
Note #2: Note that all team members should present at least once between the pitch and the final presentation. This means if your team decides to have only some members present for the pitch, the remaining members should definitely present for the final presentation.
You'll present in class and submit your slides after the class, which are due 11:59pm on the day of presentation.
Your team's slides should be submitted as a PDF file, via KLMS.
Your report should include:
One report per team. Your report should be submitted as a zip file. The main report should be written in Markdown (please use the .md extension). We're going to publish your reports on the course website. Submit using KLMS.
Now's the time for a fully functional and interactive prototype that is ready to be tested by your target users. You need to build a prototype that supports end-to-end scenarios captured in your earlier prototypes. Your prototype needs to support at least three distinct tasks. This does not mean you need to build three separate prototypes, but rather this means you need to build one complete prototype that is flexible enough to support the three tasks. You may choose to reuse or revise the tasks and the UI you created in earlier stages. Make sure your tasks are centered around novel social interaction you intend to support. Other features (e.g., detailed my page design, complex login management) can be hard-coded or fed with fake data.
Your report should include:
One report per team. Your report should be submitted as a zip file. The instructions should be written in Markdown (please use the .md extension). Submit using KLMS.
Now that you have an awesome prototype that is (hopefully) getting a lot of excitement from your crowd, it's time to tell us about what you built and what you learned from having real users use the system.
You'll have 10 minutes to do the following:
After the pitch, you'll have two minutes for Q and A.
Note #1: We'll enforce a strict 10-minute time limit by cutting off the presentation. Please plan and rehearse.
Note #2: Note that all team members should present at least once between the pitch and the final presentation. This means if your team had only some members present for the pitch, the remaining members should definitely present for the final presentation.
Here's how your pitches will be graded.
You'll present in class and submit your slides after the class.
Your team's slides should be submitted as a PDF file, via KLMS.
Now that you have deployed your system for a couple weeks, seen your crowd use the system, and collected useful data, it's time to wrap it all up! You'll write a short report and make an engaging video that showcases your system.
Record a 2-minute video that captures the user context and the killer features of your UI. Be creative in how you plan, structure, and record the video! Check out last year's project gallery for inspiration. Revisit your storyboards, as they capture the rich usage context. You need to set the stage by starting with users and their problem. Avoid using slides and try to capture realistic context, and don't hesitate to "act". Do not show the UI from the beginning. You need to show parts of your final prototype to demonstrate how the user might perform the task using your system. Rather than describe all the features you implemented, focus on the flow of the task.
Guidelines for making a video (adopted from CHI 2017 Video Showcase)Here's how your report will be graded.
Part 1: Report (10% toward your project grade)
Part 2: Video (10% toward your project grade)
Up to +10% on the final milestone
We'll reward 1-2 teams with most engaging videos. We'll announce the winner(s) and explain why they deserve the "Cool Video" title.
Up to +10% on the final milestone
Teams that successfully engage active users deserve some credit! We'll reward 1-2 teams that most successfully showed the power of the crowd. This does not just mean the most number of users, but includes the overall participation, quality of data, and your analysis of the data. We'll announce the winner(s) and explain why they deserve the "Best Crowdsourcer" title.