research-article

The motivations and experiences of the on-demand mobile workforce

Authors:

Rannie Teodoro,

Janne LindqvistAuthors Info & Claims

CSCW '14: Proceedings of the 17th ACM conference on Computer supported cooperative work & social computing

Pages 236 - 247

https://doi.org/10.1145/2531602.2531680

Published: 15 February 2014 Publication History

Abstract

On-demand mobile workforce applications match physical world tasks and willing workers. These systems offer to help conserve resources, streamline courses of action, and increase market efficiency for micro- and mid-level tasks, from verifying the existence of a pothole to walking a neighbor's dog. This study reports on the motivations and experiences of individuals who regularly complete physical world tasks posted in on-demand mobile workforce marketplaces. Data collection included semi-structured interviews with members (workers) of two different services. The analysis revealed the main drivers for participating in an on-demand mobile workforce, including desires for monetary compensation and control over schedules and task selection. We also reveal main reasons for task selection, which involve situational factors, convenient physical locations, and task requester profile information. Finally, we discuss the key characteristics of the most worthwhile tasks and offer implications for novel crowdsourcing systems for physical world tasks.

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Index Terms

The motivations and experiences of the on-demand mobile workforce
1. Human-centered computing
  1. Collaborative and social computing

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cover image ACM Conferences

CSCW '14: Proceedings of the 17th ACM conference on Computer supported cooperative work & social computing

February 2014

1600 pages

ISBN:9781450325400

DOI:10.1145/2531602

General Chairs:
Susan Fussell
Cornell University
,
Wayne Lutters
University of Maryland, Baltimore County
,
Program Chairs:
Meredith Ringel Morris
Microsoft Research
,
Madhu Reddy
Penn State University

Copyright © 2014 ACM.

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Published: 15 February 2014

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CSCW'14: Computer Supported Cooperative Work

February 15 - 19, 2014

Maryland, Baltimore, USA

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CSCW '14 Paper Acceptance Rate 134 of 497 submissions, 27%;

Overall Acceptance Rate 2,235 of 8,521 submissions, 26%

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https://doi.org/10.3390/soc15030048
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