Employing Gamified Crowdsourced Close-Range Sensing in the Pursuit of a Digital Twin of the Earth

Advances in mobile consumer technology, especially in smartphones, have given rise to numerous new crowdsourcing opportunities. With the miniaturization of sensors and the growing number of smartphone models containing a wide range of them, we are now capable of creating digital imitations of real-world objects using everyday mobile devices. In this study, we created four augmented reality (AR) applications utilizing LiDAR sensors that were designed for crowdsourcing the creation of such digital imitations, i.e., digital twins. A user study was undertaken where video recordings, audio recordings, point cloud, and mesh data were collected in forest settings. Each approach was evaluated in terms of the characteristics and quality of the crowdsourced data acquired, as well as the participants’ behavior and experience. Our findings demonstrate that through gamification approaches, we can influence not only the user experience but also the type and quality of the crowdsourced data. Our findings offer guidance on which gamification dynamics and interactions are best suited for several types of crowdsourcing tasks. We also show that the collection of meaningful data is not limited to specific interactions or experiences and suggest that there are multiple routes in gamification design for reaching the desired outcomes.