Citizen Science Forum – a website which facilitates dialogue between scientists and the

society

The 22nd ILTER Annual Meeting, Chile, 5.12.2014 (via skype & slideshare)

Eeva

Eeva Furman, Petri Ahlroth, Matti Lindholm, Jari Lyytimäki* & Riikka Paloniemi

Petri

MattiRiikka

Jari*

● A platform aimed to facilitate citizen participation, interaction, communication and data gathering.

● Open access – viewing it does not require FB account

● Participation requires FB account

● Creating your own event is possible with moderator status (inquiries by email: matti.lindholm@ymparisto.fi)

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”Citizen Science Forum” in Facebook

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● We created a FB event in order to activate the platform

● The event asks people to share their experiences on the use of insects for food

● This survey can be answered through the FB event page

● Already some responses and discussion

The first event: What insects have you used for food

#bugs4food

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The potential of FB-based communication platform

● During the first week our survey has reached over 400 people, of which over 50 have viewed the page and 20 engaged

● A promising result!○ New platform, only few ”likes”

so far and hence only few potential participants

○ No commercial advertising used so far

● The event has just begun! Please consider participation or spreading the word!https://www.facebook.com/events/745887345466849/

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Future challenges and potential uses of the platform

● First, to activate the ‘Citizen Science Forum‘ by:○ Providing an opportunity for ILTER sites and contact

persons to post regularly news (links to projects, their results & outcomes etc.) from the sites to the forum

○ Having more followers to the forum; more ‘likes’ also outside the ILTER communities

○ Thus, to make the forum ‘active’ ● Second, to activate citizen to participate through ‘events’

○ Integrating citizens to present their perspectives on the topic through facilitated process (simple surveys, sharing of material (photos, links etc.) and experiences)

○ Participating to dialogue with these citizens (through online discussions, additional materials, activities outside FB)

○ Thus, to make the forum ‘inter-active’

Thank you, and please consider participating!

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● If you have a Facebook account, you can help us by: ○ ”Liking” the Citizen Science Forum○ Sharing your own experiences on using insects as food

by writing to the event site● You can also:

○ Spread the word about the event directly to the citizens related to your ILTER site, by sharing the event in FB or by e-mailing the link:https://www.facebook.com/events/745887345466849/ or hashtag #bugs4food (Twitter, instagram).