Disclaimer – I am not affiliated with Amazon, Amazon Web Services or Amazon Mechanical Turk in any way — this is just an idea on how they can change their existing service.
This post is an “out there” idea based on top of Amazon Mechanical Turk (don’t bother reading this is until you know how AMT works) which in some regards is already an “out there” idea. I have no doubt that following system can change the internet economy from its existing state as an ad/referral model to a collective pool of people supporting each other.
I was excited to see this news release on the AWS blog today – What really got my attention was this little bit. “… and the ability to host Question on an external web site, framed within the Mechanical Turk user interface.” This is cool because AMT is letting users submit work to the site from 3rd party web forms. This eliminates the need for some of the token tricks people have been using to accomplish offsite work. It also allows Requesters to collect more advanced types of data from users. However this isn’t what got me excited…
What if AWS took this idea a few steps further and built a way that allowed for HIT’s to be displayed offsite AND be completed on BEHALF of other workers. Think AMT + Adsense or “AMTSense” as I will call it through out the rest of this post.
There is a huge gap with the current ad model of the internet economy. Regular visitors are interested in sites/projects/services yet are not willing to offer support by donating money or looking at ads. However that doesn’t mean they don’t want to support the service! I think that’s what “AMTSense” would solve; people could support one another by doing micro amounts of work for each other. This would fund so many great independent or non profit projects.
Here is a good example, look at DRADIS – my recent Windows Vista side project. What if I had “AMTSense” on my page and flat out asked you – “Hey, do you like this idea? Do you want to see it grow? This is 1/100 of how I see it in my head! Care to spare some time and do some tiny micro-tasks for me?”… I think you would be more inclined to do that than any other technique there is right now. Not to mention it would gather more supporters as people saw how the collective efforts helped my project. Now say hundreds of people all take the time to do a few HITs for me on a monthly basis. Get the idea? Now let’s get crazy here and take this one step further by making it not just web only.
AMT at the core is a WEB SERVICE, so why not add features to the API that allow users to submit HIT’s directly from desktop programs. You’ve heard of SHAREWARE, what about the concept of WORKWARE (people perform a few micro tasks in your name to pay for the right to use it). I see this concept changing the business model of anything from file download sites to the independent game industry / open source community.
Is it worth it for AWS to add these features? It’s obvious that at the moment there are not enough HITs right now to fuel this economy. Yet wouldn’t the potential of this spread the word of AMT? Wouldn’t every person that wanted to profit from this also look at how to make money from AMT as well? All someone needs to do is create a way that turns a profit for every HIT issued. That will fill the vacuum that is holding AMT back from being saturated with work.
This may be a wild idea but I have no doubt that this will be how the internet will be in the future. Google is already starting their Click per Action service but I think “AMTSense” would make more of an impact on the majority of individuals on the web. People are good at ignoring ads but they don’t ignore quality. If someone likes you, your ideas or products they will be willing to donate some spare cycles of their brain and a few minutes of their day.
I do offer consulting services so if you want to talk more about business ideas tied in with AMT then give me a call! Thanks!
Richard K Miller
August 9th, 2006
There’s a Berkley project called Mycroft that does exactly this. I like the concept of calling this “workware” on desktop apps — I’ve never heard it put that way before.
BPAndrew
August 9th, 2006
Richard thanks for the link! I checked it out and indeed it looks like it is doing what I described. However it looks like its in a early stage — there doesn’t seem to be the areas you would expect after logging in (how many tasks you’ve done, how much money you’ve made etc).
However I’m still excited, when this concept catches on it will really change how us independent bloggers and developers can make a living!
Crowdsource
August 13th, 2006
Do you know of any example questions using this external hosting?
Thanks
BPAndrew
August 13th, 2006
By question do you mean a example of a HIT/Task? Or the value of extenral forms?
If so then I have made many suggestions on this blog.. i.e.
+ Text translation
+ Security applications (log reviews, frames from security cameras etc)
+ Mass sampling (field workers asking for advice from the masses)
However your question could also be regarding the value of having a external form to submit work. The best advantage I can see is having advanced graphical input or more visually pleasing input forms. Right now on the MTurk submit page it can only render basic controls.
A talented developer could build a Flash based input tool to make the collection of data more pleasing for a user. Or build a Java applet that allows for advanced graphical input. Bitmap images can then be submitted to MTurk as Base64 encoded bitmaps.
I hope I answered your question!
Crowdsource
August 14th, 2006
That definitely answers the question and several others too! Do you know of anyone who has implemented this yet?
BPAndrew
August 14th, 2006
Well the API has only been updated recently, but there were ways of doings this before. I know this project captured drawing data from users using MTurk – http://www.thesheepmarket.com/
A thing to note is that for workflows like this, you wouldn’t need to submit your data directly into MTurk. You would only need to make sure the user was compensated for their effort. However you probably would submit user created data back to AMT for situations where you want to have quality control. i.e. You issue new HITs to ensure the first round work was done correctly.
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