Crowdsourcing in the field of interface design takes tasks traditionally performed by specific individuals and spreads them out among a group of people or a community. These assignments are usually...

Crowdsourcing and user interface design 1

Contents
Invention and growth of crowdsourcing in the field of interface design ...................................................... 2
Uses of crowdsourcing .................................................................................................................................. 4
Impact of crowdsourcing on user interface design ....................................................................................... 5
Benefits of Crowdsourcing ........................................................................................................................... 9
Drawbacks of crowdsourcing ..................................................................................................................... 10
Generating interest in the design project ..................................................................................................... 12
Evaluation of skill set of unknown users .................................................................................................... 14
Effect of crowdsourcing on budget and timeline of the project .................................................................. 16
Legal and ethical issues related with crowdsourcing .................................................................................. 16
References ................................................................................................................................................... 17
Crowdsourcing and user interface design 2

Invention and growth of crowdsourcing in the field of interface design
A User Interface is a portion of the interactive computer system, which communicates to the
user. It sits between the program consisting of hundreds to millions of lines of code and the end
user. The design of user interfaces includes all aspects of system that is visible to user. Initially,
operating computers required a special knowledge and almost all of the computer users were
specialist in the computing area and the user interfaces consisted of no more than jumper wires
on patch boards, punched cards that were prepared offline and the batch printouts.
Today specialists as well as non-specialists use computers, keyboards, mice and the video
display units are the most common interface between the hardware and the user. However, the
user interface here is the real secret as to getting non-specialists people on board. This started
when the computers began having Graphical User Interface. As of today, Graphical User
Interface is a very important area in computing. Whenever a new software is developed, it ought
to have a pleasing and a simple to use user interface. It is one of the most important selling points
as of today (Jacob, n.d.). For instance, iPhone was able to win the Smartphone war single
handedly because of the refined user interface, which was so simple, easy to use and beautiful
that many people started realizing the power of smartphones.
However designing the User Interface, although may simply seem as cutting down the
clutter and making it aesthetically pleasing is actually a much more complicated task. It requires
a special understanding of how users use that particular program, then aligning the functions,
which that particular program could perform around the interface in a way that the result is an
interface, which completely slips into the background in letting the user, perform the functions of
that application.
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In order to understand, the invention and growth of crowdsourcing in the field of interface
design, we first need to understand what crowdsourcing is. So to begin with, Crowdsourcing is
the process of getting a particular piece of work done online from a pool of people or in other
words the “Crowd”. The work could be anything from designing a physical product, to a funding
of a particular idea to the designing of a user interface. The idea behind that is to take the work
and outsource it to a crowd of workers. This crowdsourcing system works through two ways:
1. Open to all: Under the open to all method, the opportunity to do the predefined work is
generally not restricted and is open to all. That is anyone can opt in to do the work and
there is no predefined parameters required to take upon the work.
2. The most famous example for this particular type of crowdsourcing is the Wikipedia.
Instead of the Wikimedia, the organization behind the creation of Wikipedia hiring
editors, writers and paying highly for purchasing contents, they let everyone around the
world with the ability to create, edit and moderate the content. It thus lead to the creation
of the world’s largest encyclopedia. Cu
ently it is the largest and most famous
encyclopedia in the world. Perhaps, it may also be the most successful example of
crowdsourcing.
Open to all, but only few are selected through voting or bidding: In this one, the option to
take upon the work is again open to all. Interested parties would apply to that work.
However, only one or a group of people among the whole crowd is offered the work.
Freelancer.com is the perfect example of this type of crowdsourcing wherein the client
may post a work requirement such as doing a “Market research” for a particular
and.
Many people around the world would bid to offer their services, however only one of
them would be selected for the task. It might be because that his bidding amount, i.e., his
Crowdsourcing and user interface design 4

charges to complete that particular task was less than the rest or he had a great record of
accomplishment or both.
Uses of crowdsourcing
Crowdsourcing is used for a variety of purposes; some of them are as follows:
 Freelancers and Amazon Mechanical Turks were one of the very first entrants into this
market of crowdsourcing. Their business model is such that they allow all kinds of
computer related work to be posted on their website, which would then be open to others
to bid on them. Once the task is done, the person who did the job is paid the amount,
which was originally declared by the client.
 Next, it did not stop there. Soon websites like Kickstarter, 33Needs, Microventures came
out which allows the crowd to pool financial resources together in order to fund for an
idea that they find interesting. These are called Crowdfunding platforms and have
esulted in some very successful products as of date.
 Microtasking: This type of Crowdsourcing involves
eaking a large work into smaller
more manageable tasks and then allowing the community to pick up those tasks. The
turnaround time is faster and the quality is top notch, if well managed.
 Crowd sourced designs: Crowdsourcing finally also touch the flourishing market of web
and graphic design. Under these various designs such as Website design, User Interface
design, Logo Design, business collateral design and so on started gaining relevance.
Websites like 99Designs, Behance, Dri
le among others have become quite popular
for outsourcing user interface designing projects.
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Impact of crowdsourcing on user interface design
After the Web 2.0 Era, user interfaces began to be of a peculiar importance among the websites
and web based applications. The general interest among the user interface field began to propel,
and at the same time, crowdsourcing came into prominence. Just as crowdsourcing had affected
all of the areas it has touched, the field of user interface design was not left out. Many people
around the world are now considering crowdsourcing as a viable alternative to hire designers.
Generally, crowdsourcing is an extension of outsourcing which had ruled the IT industry since
the last decade. Searching for a user interface expert was generally a long process:
 It would generally involve searching for an Interface expert locally, which would involve
going posting an ad in the newspaper, classifieds sites or job sites.
 The expert would then search for the job and apply to them.
 The company would then screen shortlisted candidates and appoint them for the interview
finally getting them on board as a temporary or permanent staff
 Finally the appointed individual would start working on the design
Now, if the other party were not an individual and rather an agency, it would still be a lengthy
process in which case the following will happen:
 It would involve going around and searching for the right design companies, through
either a business directory or references or a mere internet search.
 Then it would require one to have a look at their portfolio, their past work, similar
projects and so on.
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 Then, the idea would need to be communicated to them, which would be another long
process because the format in which the requirement needs to be...