Citizen Science Data is the New Data Bitcoin

The Arctic Glass project has spiderwebbed out into a handful of directions I hadn't originally planned, one being "how to capitalize on citizen science." Originally citizen science came up only briefly on my Toolik visit, and was specific to solving instrument validation issues for USGS stream gauges in remote locations. I spoke for a while with the techs doing readings in hard-to-reach places like Barrow, AK, or even at the non-helicopter only sites like a truck ride a few miles up the pipeline haul road. Getting to these locations are time-consuming, and a misbehaving gauge doesn't often show up as an issue until the data is missing. What if there was "a guy" or someone local to the area that goes by that particular gauge on a regular basis. This "guy" might not have the training to fix instrument issues, but what if there was an early warning light or something simple to tell an average observer the instrument is having issues?

And so has been the general extent of citizen science to date. Scientists set up the observation, citizens help with the readings. This has been a great success on websites such as Zooniverse.org, and has even resulted in new discoveries coming directly from observant enthusiasts. But what happens when the volume of data we are churning out on a daily basis in our cities, airplanes, ships, and even personal devices eclipses the volume of data collected by the traditional scientific process?

This is where I personally find things to get really interesting. Here is the concept I have been playing with: What if data wasn't a product, but a currency? In that I mean, has transactional value that is measured rather than volume for volume's sake? In this model, we might view scientific data as similar to traditional dollars. Reasonably well structured and monitored (with those pesky data management plans) at the least. I akin traditional data collected by scientists and mostly for scientists just like the good 'ol dollar bill. If we assume traditional scientific data is like the dollar: trusted, backed by known "value", regulated....where does that leave data collected by citizens? OR, citizens that are also scientists, but not working in their given domain for a particular project, just for fun? (In other words, we can't assume the data is poorly collected and therefore less valid.)

So then, it looks to me like citizen science data is to data as bitcoin is to dollars. It's untrusted, wild, making its own rules, with everyone trying to constantly validate it on an old standard for traditional data that may no longer apply. Most importantly,  in the future citizen science data will most likely be more plentiful and more granular (think local collections in houses next to each other) than traditionally collected data. It's even feasible a market for citizen science data could flourish along side the market for harder-to-get scientific satellite data.

Just like bitcoin, only time will tell I suppose, if this prediction becomes a reality. However, I am feeling fairly confident here given the technology to perform credible scientific work is available. The first thing we need to figure out is value of citizen data, and also traditional scientific data for that matter. For example, at this point we aren't even sure if our data is worth a chicken, a pig, or two bags of flour....or if value is variable depending on transaction participants.