Portfolio Reflection Questions
Make a copy of this document in your Portfolio Assignments folder and answer these questions
in the spaces below. Once complete, turn in this assignment according to the steps given by
your teacher.
6.10 Impacts of CS: Crowdsourcing and Citizen Science Apps Page
Keep these questions in mind as you do the assigned readings. Write complete sentences to
answer these questions.
1. Which citizen science app did you explore? What is the purpose of the app? Describe the
functionality of the app.
Science United. The purpose of this app is to install a program on your desktop, laptop, or
tablet to allow people to volunteer and provide unused computing power (when their personal
computer is not used) for current scientific research. The app’s functionality is to use the
device’s hardware remotely for scientific researches.
2. What data does the app use and how does the app use the data collected? For example, as
a citizen scientist using the BloomWatch app, you would take pictures of cyanobacteria blooms
in water and submit the image along with the date, the state and town, weather conditions,
surface water conditions, bloom size, public access to the water, and any comments you’d like
to add. BloomWatch specifies they will store it in a public database for analysis in helping to
understand the occurrence and locations of cyanobacteria blooms, but they might also send the
data to state water quality agencies. (Hint: you might need to install the app or look at
screenshots of the app to find out the data it collects.)
The specific information of the hardware of the device, for example the size of the RAM,
storage units, or the CPU/GPU’s specific details. This app can determine the suitable task for
this device to work for, so the device’s computing power is neither underuse or over cranked.
3. What are the intended positive impacts of your citizen science app? What might be some
unintended negative impacts? You might consider impacts on society, the economy, culture,
etc.
The intended positive impact is that scientific researches can be done in more efficient speed
as people volunteer to provide additional free computing power. Some unintended negative
impacts might be that it could be possible that the information about the device being leaked,
or can accidentally over work the device.