New preprint out: 'Peer Production Practices: Design Strategies in Online Citizen Science Platforms'!

2021-05-27

We have just released a new preprint on SocArXiv: Kloppenborg, K., Ball, M. P., & Greshake Tzovaras, B. (2021, May 23). Peer Production Practices: Design Strategies in Online Citizen Science Platforms. https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/rw58y

In this article, we inspect three online citizen science platforms - iNaturalist, Public Lab and Zooniverse - from a peer production perspective, making use of a working model of peer production focused on web design.

In doing so, we address two questions:

• “To what extent does knowledge production on these platforms follow peer production principles?” and
• “Which mechanisms and features do these platforms use to facilitate the peer production of knowledge in practice?”

We hope to give insights on the aptness and current implementation of peer production elemens in citizen science, as well as to provide orientation and guidance for citizen science practicioners who are interested in increasing the level of participation in their projects, to reflect on whether a peer production approach would be suitable for their case and to give examples on how this approach could look like in practice.