Cyber cafes as microtasking hubs

Abstract

Crowdsourced microtasking has been largely accessible on personal computers. With the rather low penetration of personal computers in countries like India, this has meant that microtasking opportunities have been limited to the educated elite with access to PC and Internet. In this paper we explore the use of cybercafes as microtasking hubs, thus overcoming the need to own an Internet connected computer. We conducted a one week exploratory study with three cyber cafes in Bangalore - where we provided users with an opportunity to work on a few transcription tasks in the cyber cafe and earn in the form of mobile airtime (recharge). We also conducted in-depth interviews with users and cyber owners. Overall we found that successful adoption of a microtasking eco-system at a cyber cafe is highly co-related with the cyber cafe environment and owners motivation. We also uncover practice of Pair Microtasking -- where more than one person works on a single task and highlight its implications on task design and task accuracy.