Organising crowdsourcing: What motivates online volunteers ?

Companies increasingly outsource activities to volunteers that they approach via an open call on the internet. The phenomenon is called ‘crowdsourcing’. In general rewards are absent, in some cases the best contributions are rewarded by means of recognition on the website or by monetary prizes. To make effective use of crowdsourcing, it is important to understand what motivates these online volunteers and what is the influence of rewards.

Irma Borst from the Erasmus University of Rotterdam has investigated in her phd thesis the effects of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation of volunteers on the decision to contribute and on the quantity, usefulness and novelty of contributions that these online volunteers provide. Three crowdsourcing communities were investigated http://www.tweakers.net/, http://www.nufoto.nl/, http://www.greenchallenge.info/

A crowdsourcing classification is proposed in which crowdsourcing initiatives are classified on the basis of their reward systems:
A) Gift sourcing (no or small financial rewards);
B) Expert sourcing (large financial rewards)
C) Game Sourcing (extreme money rewards).

The proposed classification of rewards systems will help organizers of online communities to set up effective reward systems.

Phd thesis Irma Borst