Gamification in Crowdsourcing Applications

In recent years, new forms of game and game technologies have emerged in the fields of industry and academia research. In particular, it is evident the growth of seri- ous and pervasive games. In this context, a new trend, called “gamification” has reached and won many sectors, including the business and the marketing domains (Seaborn and Fels, 2015). Such a new trend essentially uses game design and elements with the aim of improving users’ experience and increasing users’ involvement in services and applications which are not games (Deterding et al. 2011). Its goal is explicitly different from the merely users’ entertainment. It is worth noting that gamification is not a new issue, but it can go back to market- ing activities and techniques (i.e. points cards and rewards memberships), usually ex- ploited to engage clients, by creating or enforcing loyalty in a product or in a brand (Zichermann and Linder, 2010). Current technologies, together with the widespread and massive use of social media and mobile devices can be identified as joining causes which are facilitating the diffusion and adoption of gamification techniques in so many and different contexts (Seaborn and Fels, 2015). The first successful example of gamified service has been Foursquare. Starting from such an experience, other several gamified applications were born, exploiting game elements together with interactive design and digital marketing issues (Zichermann and Linder, 2010). At the same time, gamification has been recognized as a key issue to support and incentive massive collaboration from and among users (McGonigal, 2011). The goal of this work is to define Gamification, by summarizing game design ele- ments which characterize it, and by describing how such elements can be exploited in crowdsourcing systems, improving crowd’s experience and involvement. The remainder of the work is organized as follows. The “Gamification” section de- scribes the introduction of the term, the game elements which characterize it and pla y- ers’ motivations. The section entitled “Gamification in crowdsourcing systems and social media” presents some examples of crowdsourcing applications which benefit from the use of gamification. Finally “Conclusion” closes the paper.