2018 International Conference on Cyberworlds

Towards Citizen-powered Cyberworlds for Environmental Monitoring

Gamification and Virtual spaces to enhance participatory sensing for Environmental Applications

Maria Krommyda Evangelos Sdongos

Institute of Communication and Computer Systems Institute of Communication and Computer Systems
I-SENSE Group I-SENSE Group
Athens, Greece Athens, Greece
maria.krommyda@iccs.gr evangelos.sdongos@iccs.gr

Stefano Tamascelli Dr. Athanasia Tsertou

XTeam Software Solutions srls Institute of Communication and Computer Systems
Rovigo, Italy I-SENSE Group
tamascelli@xteamsoftware.com Athens, Greece
athanasia.tsertou@iccs.gr

Geli Latsa Dr. Angelos Amditis

Institute of Communication and Computer Systems Institute of Communication and Computer Systems
I-SENSE Group I-SENSE Group
Athens, Greece Athens, Greece
g.latsa@iccs.gr a.amditis@iccs.gr

Abstract — ICT advances in emerging domains such as information but do not contribute any content or support the
Internet of Things (IoT), Augmented Reality/ Virtual Reality data collection in any way. In one of the empirical studies of
(AR/VR), big data analytics, cyber-physical systems and cloud this phenomenon, this observation was supported within the
computing have revolutionized and boosted the creation of digital health social network context [1]. A solution to the
cyberworlds as information spaces that allow us to augment problem of user engagement might come through the
the way we interact with each other and with the physical gamification of the process [2]. This technique is exploited in
world. Naturally, other than businesses cyberworlds can Scent [3], an EU project which provides an integrated set of
benefit modern hyper connected societies at their entirety smart, collaborative and innovating technologies that
(transport, mobility, health, smart living, etc.) and further to
augment costly in-situ infrastructure, enabling citizens to
that the physical world around us can also be part of such
process. In the present paper the focus is given on citizen-
become the ‘eyes’ of the policy makers by monitoring land
powered cyberworlds for Environmental Monitoring which are cover / land use (LC/LU) changes and related environmental
created from crowdsourced observations engaging, through phenomena like floods by crowdsourcing relevant
gamification, citizens and communities. The means of information. As part of the project an augmented reality
engagement include serious gaming, collection of geo-tagged game has been developed that aims to make the process of
IoT, such as images, video and sensor measurements as well as crowdsourcing data fun and engaging. The game shows on a
management and storage of diverse IoT as OGC compliant map points of interest (PoIs), defined by the policy makers
observations all conveyed into a dedicated information space. and guides the users there by asking them to look for and
collect ‘little animals’ that live there. When the user is within
Keywords: citizen-powered cyberworld, partcipatory sensing the range of a PoI, she receives instructions about the
and crowdsensing, cyber-physical information spaces, required task at the specific point. The tasks may vary from
gamification, virtual collaborative monitoring. taking an image or a video, to taking a measurement using a
portable environmental sensor and providing input regarding
I. INTRODUCTION river measurements. Successfully completing a task rewards
The greatest challenge in Citizen Science is keeping the the user with points and adds the ‘little animal’ that residents
users motivated to contribute over a period of time. The 1% there to her collection. As an additional incentive, after
rule of thumb, or 90-9-1 principle as it is often called, refers completing a certain number of tasks the game rewards the
to the observed phenomenon that only around 1% of users of user with a badge celebrating the milestone. The process of
any application or website contribute the vast majority of collecting points, badges and ‘little animals’ is used to
new content, with a further 9% contributing sparingly or promote the competition between the users and support the
doing secondary tasks of lesser importance. The majority of participation. All the data collected from the tasks are sent to
individuals, approximately 90%, use the collected the game’s backend and stored in a Harmonisation platform

978-1-5386-7315-7/18/$31.00 ©2018 IEEE 454

DOI 10.1109/CW.2018.00090
as Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) [4] compliant the state-of-the-art image recognition algorithm SURF
observations in order to support the reusability and repurpose (Speeded Up Robust Features) to extract from multimedia
of the crowdsourced data. (video & image) water level and water surface velocity
measurements.
II. SYSTEM ARCHITECTURE
Europe has invested a lot in infrastructure to achieve an
accurate Earth observation capacity. Initiatives such as
Copernicus [5] provide a mapping of forest areas, wetlands
or artificial surfaces; yet, the burden of investing in new
equipment or maintaining the current infrastructure is
unsustainable. Ways of complementing the in-situ
infrastructure with citizen-sourced data at a low cost are
currently investigated. Recognizing that citizen participation
in environmental policy making is in its infancy and that
citizens feel unable to influence environmental policies the
Scent toolbox aims to alleviate this barrier. Through a
constellation of smart technologies, it enables citizens to
support the policy makers by monitoring LC/LU changes as
part of their everyday activities augmenting the in-situ
infrastructure with a people-generated observation web.
In order to achieve its goals, the Scent toolbox is based
on an innovative architectural design that is presented in
Figure 1, where key components dedicated to specific tasks
are connected in a way that allows the flow of information
from local authorities, to volunteers, to environmental
experts and back to the authorities that can now have
Figure 1 Architectural overview of Scent
improved monitoring of the phenomena of interest allowing
them to make educated decisions that can help and support Aiming to support the collection of the data needed for
the areas. The key components of Figure 1 are presented the flood models a collection of environmental sensors are
here. going to be incorporated to the toolbox. The sensors will
A central component of the architecture is the crowd- range from in-situ sensors that are available in the areas of
sourcing platform which provides a series of tools and interest, portable sensors that the volunteers use to collect
applications that allow the flow of information between the additional measurements as well as sensors mounted on
different components of the toolbox. It also enables the drones flying over the areas of interest.
creation of information from policy makers and forwards A Harmonisation platform has been implemented to
contributions from the volunteers to the backend. It includes collect all the crowdsourced observations, transform them to
the Campaign Manager, a dedicated tool for policy makers OGC compliant observations, store them with respect to time
that allows them to identify areas of interest, create and space as such and offer them to the Scent toolbox
campaigns and PoIs and access the collected and extracted components as needed as well as to GEOSS (Global Earth
information in a user-friendly way as map overlays. Part of Observation System of Systems) [7] as web services making
the crowdsourcing platform is also the series of gaming the collected data findable and re-usable. Part of the
applications that aim to engage volunteers to perform the Harmonisation platform is also the Data Quality Module that
actions that have been defined in the Campaign manager, assigns a trust level to every registered user and sensor,
collection of images, videos, river and sensor measurements ensuring that the crowd-sourced data are of high quality,
and to contribute to environmental monitoring by providing, devoted of noise and all malicious contributions are
qualifying and interpreting information about LC/LU. identified and isolated.
Part of the Scent toolbox is also an intelligence engine, The Scent toolbox will be evaluated for a year during a
which uses innovative machine learning techniques to series of campaigns starting the summer of 2018 in two large
classify and annotate images from citizens and open scale pilots of great environmental impact; the urban site of
platforms. The classification is done with respect to the Scent Kifisos River in Athens, Greece and the rural site of Danube
taxonomy, which is based on the CORINE Delta in Romania.
(Coordinate Information on the Environment) [6] taxonomy, Finally, the collected data along with the extracted
but is also enriched to include elements needed for the flood information from the different components will be used to
models. To fully utilize the collected and extracted improve the flood models of the areas, quantify the impact of
information, the validated data are used to create improved LC/LU changes to flood maps and spatio-temporal flooding
LC/LU maps. In addition, to support the collection of river patterns enabling more effective flood-related planning and
measurements in a uniform way, useful to the flood models management by policy makers.
and invariant of the experience of the volunteers to collect
scientific data two tools have been developed. The tools use

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 III. GAMIFICATION AND VIRTUAL SPACES TO ENHANCE guiding the user to locate the ‘little animal’ and as a result
PARTICIPATORY SENSING FOR ENVIRONMENTAL take images with specific orientation that will include
APPLICATIONS information of interest [10,11]. Extra care has been taken, for
older phones that might not have these sensors available, to
A series of data and actions have been defined as very keep the user experience the same and the data collection as
important for the monitoring of the LC/LU changes and the close to the optimal as possible. The user interface of the
improvement of the flood models, these data have been application is presented in Figure 2.
mapped to straightforward, time-effective and meaningful
actions that the volunteers can carry out collecting at the
same time the needed data. These actions can be described as
follows. (i) Annotate, with tags from the Scent taxonomy,
images collected by the Open Image tool. (ii) Take an image
of specific objects in a predefined area (e.g., vegetation at the
river bank, waste and brought materials in the manholes, tree
banks/branches, dustbins, cars and vehicles along the river
bank or in smaller streams connected to the main river). (iii)
Take an image or video in a very specific point of interest
(e.g, image of a water level indicator, video of a predefined
floating object). (iv) Answer to questionnaires at areas of
interest to support the collection of structured data. (v) Use
portable sensors to take some environmental measurements
Based on the above identified actions four independent
applications have been designed to simplify the process, Figure 2: Scent Explore app
boost the user engagement and collect properly formatted
data of high quality. B. Collaborate
A. Explore App The Scent Collaborate is a browser-based crowdsourcing
Scent Explore is a mobile application that the volunteers platform that allows users to annotate existing images
use to locate specific areas of interest, find each point where choosing elements from the Scent taxonomy that are
specific tasks should be carried out, and gain rewards when depicted in them. The same picture can be annotated by more
successfully concluding them. Two reward mechanisms than one user as the validation mechanism at the
(points and badges [8,9] ) are used to boost the user Crowdsourcing backend validates only tags that are of high
engagement. The tasks that the users are asked to carry out degree of confidence and invalidates the ones that have been
and for which they are rewarded are: (i) Take a photo using confirmed as wrong from more than one user. In order for an
their smart phone containing a specific object from the Scent image to be pushed to the Harmonisation platform for
taxonomy. (ii) Go to a specific location and finding/collect storage all the tags should have a validation status. Here too
the ‘little animal’ that lives there. This functionality will the same two reward mechanisms are applied as the user is
allow the user to spot the exact place where a water level rewarded with points based on the number of annotated
indicator is located, or where a sensor should be placed in pictures. Once more the points are connected to badges that
order to collect a proper measurement. (iii) Answer acknowledge the achievements of the users. Scent
questionnaires regarding the area. Collaborate is oriented toward a broad audience interested in
The user can either play as guest or as registered user, joining the Scent movement even if they are not living close
while it has been decided to have a single database for user to an area of interest. The platform targets citizens interested
profiles. This means that the users, who register through this in environmental issues, contributing to science and
application, can also use the same account for the other supporting the policy makers.
gaming applications having a consistent user experience. C. Captcha
Another functionality of the Explore app is that when a user
is near a ‘little animal’/PoI, even if she is not looking at the This is a browser-based plugin to be integrated in third-
map and/or the phone is in standby mode, the device will party websites when there is a need to verify that the user is
vibrate, the camera will automatically turn on and the user actually a human and not a robot. The user is asked to spot
will be invited to take a picture of the area. The user will which of the images presented to her include a tag from the
then be asked to tag the picture with elements from the Scent Scent taxonomy, the response is used to support the
taxonomy. The user can also take and tag pictures of areas validation mechanism for the annotations.
and objects which do not correspond to predetermined points
D. Sensor Measurement Collection App
of interest; allowing the user to contribute at any given
moment data that she feels are of interest. When the user This is a mobile application that is used in addition to the
looks into the camera while searching for a little animal, the Explore App to communicate with the portable sensors
GPS position will be integrated with the vector data of the available at the area of interest, record the measurements and
gyroscope or with data coming from the accelerometer send them to the backend. The users can login using their

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available account and collect rewards for their contributions. 2018 onwards, several thematic campaigns, focused on the
The same two reward mechanisms are applied here as well collection of LC/LU images, sensor measurements and river
with the user getting points based on the number of sensor data, will take place in each pilot area, where volunteers will
measurements. Once more the points are connected to be engaged with specific test cases and tools. The pilot
badges that celebrate the achievements of the users. activities will run for a period of approximately 10 months,
foreseeing at least 6 different campaigns in each pilot area.
IV. CASE STUDY The concept of the thematic campaigns was carefully chosen,
The two regions where the Scent toolbox is going to be to allow the organization of a dedicated workshop at the start
test, as mentioned above, are the Danube Delta in Romania of each campaign where volunteers will not only be
and the Kifisos River basin in Athens, Greece. The two pilot informed about the project and but also be trained in the use
areas were chosen carefully in order to test the toolbox in of the Scent toolbox used during the campaign.
two fundamental different topologies of areas with different The pilot activities will be of vital importance to the
needs and challenges. In the Danube Delta in Romania proof of concept that gasification can support user
(Figure 3), the flooding is a necessary and welcome part of engagement and will allow us to carefully study the user
maintaining the ecosystem, as the unique ecosystem of the behavioral patterns, identify successful user engagement
area with the vibrant wildlife and the remarkable plant life, is strategies and calculate all the Key Performance Indicators
sustained by these waters. There it is important to understand (KPIs) that are indicative of the system performance.
how these flood waters work, how the climate changes and
the changes in the LC/LU of the area affect the phenomena V. CONCLUSIONS
and what measures should be taken for the sustainability of As it has been presented, careful planning along with an
the ecosystem before it is too late. innovative architectural design and a constellation of smart
technologies can contribute to better decision-making
through the empowerment and active role of citizens in
environmental monitoring. The Scent toolbox provides the
means for user engagement allowing citizens to contribute
proper scientific data as needed to researchers. It also
delivers citizen-powered cyberworlds for Environmental
Monitoring created from crowdsourced observations
engaging through gamification citizens and communities.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
Figure 3 Danube Delta pilot area
This paper is supported by European Union’s Horizon
In the Kifisos River (Figure 4) the challenges are 2020 research and innovation programme under grant
completely different given the urban environment. The agreement no 688930, project SCENT (Smart Toolbox for
Engaging Citizens into a People-Centric Observation Web).
landscape is changing fast and dramatically as streams are
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