Popcorn Hack #2

Find a website that uses reCaptcha.
Example: The Google login page uses reCaptcha to make sure a real person is trying to log in and not a bot.

Popcorn Hack #3

Find a public dataset and describe what it’s used for. What do you think are the good and bad things about this dataset?
Example: The Global Health Observatory (GHO) data by the World Health Organization (WHO) tracks global health stats, like how common certain diseases are and vaccination rates.

  • Pros: It’s reliable, covers lots of countries, and helps with health research.
  • Cons: Some data might be old, not every country reports the same way, and there could be gaps in information.

Hacks

Question 1

What is crowdsourcing? Give two examples (that weren’t in the lesson) of how it’s used in different fields.
Answer: Crowdsourcing is when a company or group asks a large number of people to help with a project, usually online. It’s a way to gather ideas, opinions, or work from a lot of different people.

  • Example 1: OpenStreetMap – A project where volunteers contribute and update maps to create a free, crowdsourced alternative to Google Maps.
  • Example 2: Zooniverse – A platform where everyday people help scientists classify galaxies, transcribe historical documents, and analyze wildlife images.

Question 2

Give an example of a successful crowdsourcing project. What was it about, what were its goals, and what good things came from it?
Answer: One example is Foldit, a game where people solve puzzles to help scientists figure out how proteins are shaped.

  • Goals: To help medical research by understanding proteins better.
  • Outcomes: Players actually helped scientists discover an important protein structure that helped with HIV research, proving that gaming and science can work together!

Question 3

What are some problems with crowdsourcing? Why do some people dislike it? Give specific examples.
Answer: There are a few downsides to crowdsourcing:

  • Quality issues: Since anyone can contribute, some information might be wrong or unreliable.
  • Unfair pay: Some companies use crowdsourcing to get work done for very little money (like Amazon Mechanical Turk, where people do small tasks for a few cents each).
  • Privacy risks: Sometimes, data collected from crowdsourcing gets used in ways people didn’t agree to (like facial recognition databases built from publicly uploaded photos).

Question 4

Find a public dataset that would work for your Pilot City project.
Answer: The CDC Diabetes Surveillance Data tracks diabetes rates, risk factors, and health trends across the U.S. This could be really useful for the Pilot City project to understand diabetes trends and create a better interactive glucose education game.