Crowdsourcing game
Launched in 2009 by the Netherlands Institute for Sound & Vision in collaboration with the Dutch public broadcaster KRO, Waisda? (which translates to What’s that?) is the first operational video labeling game to collect user-generated metadata in the cultural heritage field. The game consists of two or more users who play against each other by entering relevant tags that describe the content of the video fragment(typically between 1 and 10 minutes long). The goal of each player is to score points by entering the same tags as one of the other players. If a tag matches another player’s tag (perhaps from a previous session for the same video), both players are awarded points.
Woordentikkertje
The Waisda? game has been online in various versions and has been used to tag video archives of several public broadcasting associations. One version was called “Woordentikkertje”(which translates to word tag) which was launched in 2011. In cooperation with the Dutch broadcaster NCRV and the VU University Amsterdam the game was built around the popular tv program “Man bijt hond”(Man bites Dog). On the website woordentikkertje.manbijthond.nl users have created over 760.000 tags, and counting.
Research
With the crowdsourced tags from Woordentikkertje the VU University Amsterdam has been researching the ‘semantic gap’. This gap consists of the difference between the way users tag a video and how professional documentalists enhance content with tags. Where a professional describes a video on an abstract level (subject), a user describes the audiovisual content on a more concrete level (specific elements in the video). Michiel Hildebrand has published the current findings of the ongoing research here.
Spotvogel
The latest application of Waisda? is called “Spotvogel”, which translates to mocker. This online game was developed by the Dutch broadcaster VARA and Sound & Vision in order to create a more accessible and searchable archive of the footage from the Dutch televsion program “Vroege Vogels”(Early Birds). Likewise with Woordentikkertje, the Spotvogel game makes players compete against each other to tag video’s with relevant keywords. In this way, the online archive of 'Vroege Vogels' is enriched with crowdsourced metadata.
Colofon
Waisda? is a project of the Netherlands Institute for Sound & Vision in cooperation with the KRO, in the context of Images for the Future. The VU University of Amsterdam provides in the context of the European research program PrestoPRIME additional advice on the handling of public descriptions and improvements to the game.
More Info
- Waisda? won the Best Archives on the Web award in the category Best Use of Crowdsourcing in 2010
- Waisda? won the EuroITV Competition Grand Challenge in 2010.
- Waisda? won the TIMAF European Best Practices award in 2009.