Featured Challenge |
This is a place holder. Once there are challenges posted; one will be shown here. |
Open Challenges |
Once there are challenges posted, they'll be listed with links here. |
Upcoming Challenges |
This will be a list of challengers and key phrases so people can see what new challenges will be opening up in the near future.
|
What challenge projects are:
Experienced researchers can post "Challenges" to get help solving a specific problem and aid the researcher in carrying out a larger study. Challenges are a special subset of Project pages, which will be highlighted prominently. Challenge projects: a) have significant scientific value, and b) follow guidelines that will make it easier and more enjoyable for both the challenger and other participants.
Researchers posing challenges:
- Will be able to use the wiki to solve problems, with a format giving clear lines of authorship and contribution.
- Have a tool to find collaborators outside their professional network, including skilled non-scientists, amateurs, and others.
- Gain a new way to make their work have a broader impact on society.
Users who help solve challenge projects will:
- Get to use their creativity and skills to advance significant, original research.
- Be able to interact with people with shared interests, including the scientist who posed the challenge.
- Get an entry point for research, by having a discrete problem to solve.
Proposing challenges:
Participating in challenges:
What is IGoR's role in challenges?
IGoR's sole responsibility is to list challenge projects. It is solely the user's responsibility to decide whether participating in the challenge is appropriate to their skills, local laws, and safety concerns. Challengers' sole responsibility is posing a problem, the solution of which will advance their larger research aims; however, they should monitor their page and provide feedback to participants.
Updated: 10 Feb 2015 22:42 Mickey von Dassow
#Comments: 4
If people like the idea of challenge projects, I'll add links to a list of challenge projects on a separate page, and this page (and the front page) will show a featured challenge (once there are some challenges).
JS pointed out that framing social things in terms of what people get out of doing something can make people less likely to do it, so I've changed the language to focus less on explicitly saying how users/challengers would benefit. Also shortened it.
Based on my year of trying to get IGoR started, it's clear people won't jump in to something new just because they like an idea. However, people will try new things even if they require some effort to get started (e.g. LinkedIn, Facebook, or editing Wikipedia) if enough other people have tested the waters, and found them hospitable.
To get those first few people one either needs a lot of charisma (not happening) or clear incentives. However Jim Strother pointed about that rewards and incentives also have downsides. He said I could quote him, because he makes his point quite clearly:
I like the idea of challenges, and I think it could work well once the site has regular traffic. Just make sure the other projects don't get overshadowed by the challenge projects. I didn't see anything substantive to change in your text above.