Chiara Bonacchi, Daniel Pett, Andrew Bevan and Adi Keinan-Schoonbaert Paper presented at Computer Applications in Archaeology Conference 2014, 22nd - 25th April 2014, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, Paris as part of Session 12: Community Archaeology and Technology. Session organisers: Nicole Beale and Eleonora Gandolfi. Session blog: http://blog.soton.ac.uk/comarch/

1. Developing
MicroPasts
CAA, 24 April 2014
Developing
MicroPasts
CAA, 24 April 2014
Chiara Bonacchi
UCL Institute of Archaeology
with Andrew Bevan (UCL)
Daniel Pett (British Museum)
Adi Keinan-Schoonbaert (UCL)
Chiara Bonacchi
UCL Institute of Archaeology
with Andrew Bevan (UCL)
Daniel Pett (British Museum)
Adi Keinan-Schoonbaert (UCL)

2. 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

3. Crowd-sourcing projects
• Diverse range:
– Inspecting imagery for
archaeological features
– Transcribing papyri
– Interrogating built architecture
– Public recording of metal
finds…

4. Crowd-funding projects
• Ranging from excavations to
dissertations
• Using existing or new
dedicated platforms
• Varying degrees of success

5. Observations
• Mainly contributory models
• Little evaluation done
ContributoryContributory
CollaborativeCollaborative
Co-creativeCo-creative
HostedHosted
Models for participation:
Public Participation in Scientific Research
Project, further elaborated on by Simon

6. Introducing MicroPasts
• A collaboration between UCL
and the British Museum
• Funded by the AHRC, Digital
transformations in community
research co-production

7. 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

8. April
Launch
Day!
Launch
Day!

9. MicroPasts website
micropasts.org

10. Component 1: crowd-sourcing platform
crowdsourced.micropasts.org

11. Crowd-sourcing applications
• 4 applications
• Focused on British Prehistory

12. Help cataloguing
• 30,000 index cards of all
known Bronze Age metal
artefact finds in the UK from
1800 to 1983

13. Transcription and geo-referencing

14. Help creating 3D models
• 3D SfM models of palstaves
recorded in the British Museum
Bronze Age Index (Photoscan)

15. Image masking

16. Component 2: community forum
community.micropasts.org
• Discourse (https://github.com/discourse/discourse)
• For research and platform co-design

17. 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

18. 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?

19. 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

20. 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

21. 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

22. 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

23. 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)

24. Developing
MicroPast
Developing
MicroPast
Thank you!
c.bonacchi@ucl.ac.uk
Thank you!
c.bonacchi@ucl.ac.uk