TECHNO-SOCIAL PLATFORM FOR SUSTAINABLE ......facilitating the developer’s work. Nowadays, it is a developer-friendly platform that facilitates the creation of modern real-time collaborative

P2Pvalue Deliverable D3.4 P2Pvalue Platform 1.0

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TECHNO-SOCIALPLATFORMFORSUSTAINABLEMODELSANDVALUEGENERATIONINCOMMONSBASEDPEERPRODUCTIONINTHEFUTUREINTERNET

Programme:FP7-ICT-2013-10Project:610961

Startdate:2013-10-01Duration:36months

DeliverableD3.4

D3.4:P2Pvalueplatformv1.0

Submissiondate:2016-09-30

Organisationnameofleadcontractorforthisdeliverable:UCM

DisseminationStatus

PU Public X

PP Restrictedtootherprogrammeparticipants(includingtheCommissionServices)

RE Restrictedtoagroupspecifiedbytheconsortium(includingtheCommissionServices)

CO Confidential,onlyformembersoftheconsortium(includingtheCommissionServices)

License

This report (and all its contents and images unless otherwise specified), are released under a license Creative Commons Attribution 4.0

International(CCBY4.0).Theauthors(allbelongingtotheP2Pvalueproject)arespecifiedinthefollowingpages.Thefull licensetextcanbe

foundinhttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/


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DocumentInformation

Author(s)(alphabeticalorder) Organisation(alphabeticalorder) E-mail

SamerHassan UniversidadComplutensedeMadrid [email protected]

PabloOjanguren UniversidadComplutensedeMadrid [email protected]

AntonioTapiadordelDujo UniversidadComplutensedeMadrid [email protected]

AntonioTenorio-Fornés UniversidadComplutensedeMadrid [email protected]

Contributor(s)(alphabeticalorder) Organisation(alphabeticalorder) E-mail

PrimaveraDeFilippi CNRS [email protected]

MayoFusterMorell Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona

(IGOP)

[email protected]

JavierArroyo UniversidadComplutensedeMadrid [email protected]

JuanPavón UniversidadComplutensedeMadrid [email protected]

NigelGilbert UniversityofSurrey [email protected]

DavidRozas UniversityofSurrey [email protected]

Documenthistory

Version(s) Date Change

Vo.1 September1,2016 Startingversion,template

V0.8 September21,2016 Versionforreview

V1.0 September30,2016 ApprovedversiontobesubmittedtoEU

Documentdata

Keywords commons-based peer production, communities, federation, decentralization, P2P,

collaboration, real-time, SwellRT, pear2pear, collaborative software, FLOSS, open


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source,docker,angularJS,javascript,java,Teem

Editoraddressdata [email protected]

Deliverydate September30,2016

Distributionlist

Date Issue E-mail

2016-09-30 Consortiummembers [email protected]

2016-09-30 Projectofficer [email protected]

2016-09-30 ECarchive [email protected]


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P2PvalueConsortium

Projectobjectives

● Developmentofasoftwareplatform

○ Understand, experiment with, design and build a collective intelligence techno-social federated

collaborativeplatformthatwillfosterthesustainabilityofcommunitiesofcollaborativeproduction.

○ Deployseveralcustomisednodesofthefederatedplatforminwhichreal-worldcommunitieswill interact,

participate,andcollaborativelycreatecontent.

● TheoryandPolicy

○ DevelopCBPPtheory,basedonmultidisciplinaryandmulti-methodresearchonCBPP,anddeterminethe

factorsforsuccess,productivity,andresilienceincommunities(“bestpractices”).

○ DevelopasetofvaluemetricsandrewardmechanismsthatincentivisetheparticipationofcitizensinCBPP.

○ Simulate the new sustainability models proposed, showing how robust they are in the face of diverse

communityconditions.

○ Verify the compatibility of the proposed models with innovation policies and provide a series of policy

recommendationsforpublicadministrationstoencourageCBPP-drivensocialinnovation.

● DataandResources

○ ProvideadirectoryofexistingCBPPcommunities,togetherwiththeirmaincharacteristics.

Maintain an openweb-based CBPP archive,with the collected data-sets, surveys, reports, Open Educational Resources and

open-accesspublications,freelyavailabletootherresearchersandthird-partiesunderanopencopyleftlicense.Thisincludesa

projectpublicrepositorywithallcodeavailableasfree/opensource.


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ExecutiveSummary

Afterthreeyearsofresearch,explorationanddevelopment,P2Pvaluehasproducedtwolargesoftwareoutcomes:Teem,aweb

and mobile app to increase participation in Commons-based Peer Production (CBPP) communities, and SwellRT, the first

backendframeworktobuilddecentralizedreal-timecollaborativeapps.

In CBPP communities, there is an “invisible wall” between those actively contributing (core members and occasional

contributors) and those who do not, which are the majority of the community (the users or audience, but also potential

contributors). Teemmainaim is to reduce such invisiblewallheight,makingcommunitiesmore inclusiveand facilitate their

growthandsustainability.

Teem is the last evolution of the participatory Lean development process that P2Pvalue has followed. Nowadays, Teem

providesavisualway forcommunitygroups togetpeople involved,whileenablingacollaborativeworkspace.Theappuses

state-of-the-arttechnologywhichallowsittobe(1)decentralized,(2)real-time,and(3)extensible.

SwellRThasevolvedfurtherthis3rdyear,andhasbeenestablishedasanindependentrobustproduct,withaspecialefforton

facilitatingthedeveloper’swork.Nowadays,itisadeveloper-friendlyplatformthatfacilitatesthecreationofmodernreal-time

collaborativeapplications,whicharedecentralizedandinteroperableusingmodernprotocols.AnindicatorofSwellRT’ssuccess

isthattheactualApacheWaveprojecthasaskedustoadopttheSwellRTcodebase,discardingtheirowncodebase(finalofficial

votetobeheldonSept28th).

The most remarkable features developed this 3rd year are a new API for JavaScript integration, support of widgets and

annotations,webeditorpresence,renovatedfederationinfrastructureandseveraldocumentationandcommunicationefforts.


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Contents

1.Teem:Avisualwayforcommunitygroupstogetpeopleinvolved. .............................................................................................. 7

Introduction .................................................................................................................................................................................... 7

Thevisionandvalueproposition .................................................................................................................................................... 8

1. AvisualwaytodecreasetheInvisibleWall. ................................................................................................................. 10

2. TheHiddenPotential .................................................................................................................................................... 13

2.SwellRT:DecentralizedReal-TimeCollaboration ......................................................................................................................... 14


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1. Teem: A visual way for community groups to get people

involved.

Introduction

Afterthreeyearsofresearch,explorationanddevelopment,P2Pvaluehasproducedtwolargesoftwareoutcomes:SwellRT,the

first backend framework to build decentralized real-time collaborative apps, and Teem, a web andmobile app to increase

participation in Commons-based Peer Production (CBPP) communities. This sectionwill explain the final evolution of Teem

whilethenextsectionwillcoverSwellRT’sprogress.

The app named “Teem” is the final stage of the process of participatory research through Lean UX and Design Thinking

methodologies, as exposed in previous deliverablesD3.2 andD3.3methodological chapters. After exploring and developing

multipleprototypes,by theendof the2ndyearweconverged into the“crowd-doing”concept (D3.3).This ideawas further

refinedduringthis3rdyear,addingfunctionalitiesandbuildingastableandrobustappthataimsto(1)facilitateparticipationin

CBPPcommunities,(2)serveasacompleteexampleofthecapabilitiesofSwellRTdecentralizedcollaborativetechnology.

The concept of Teem is now summarised as “a visualway for community groups to get people involved”, after it has keep

evolvingbasedontheinsightsfromtheexperimentationwithCBPPcommunities.Insteadofgettingintothetechnicaldetails

like in D3.3, this section depicts what is Teem, and how it helps communities to attract collaboration to smooth the

participationincommunitiesandboosttheirsustainability.


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Thevisionandvalueproposition

Collaborativecommunitiesandpeerproductionare innovativefast-growingmodelsofproduction.Howevertheysufferfrom

sustainabilityandinclusivenessproblems,becausetheyheavilydependonafewmembersthatcarryoutmostofthework.The

distribution of effort in these communities usually follows a power law distribution (the 1-9-90 rule)1. We have used this

distributiontocharacterizetheusersegmentsofourtool2:

● The1%,orcoremembers,whichpushforwardthecommunity;

● The9%,orareoccasionalcontributors,withmoreirregularparticipation;

● And the90%,or theusers/readers,whichdonotdirectly contributebutmay share, rate, tweetordiscuss the co-

createdresources.

1 Nielsen, Jakob (2006) "The 90-9-1 Rule for Participation Inequality in Social Media and Online Communities". http://www.nngroup.com/articles/participation-inequality/ 2Deliverable 3.3, Platform Design Chapter


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Figure1:GraphsshowingthePowerLawdistributionofeffortand1-9-90rule.

CBPP communities heavily depend on volunteers. However, there is an “invisiblewall” between those actively contributing

(coremembers andoccasional contributors) and thosewhodonot,which are themajority of the community (theusers or

audience,butalsopotentialcontributors).Ifwecouldreducesuchwall,itwouldfacilitateparticipationandonboardingofnew

members, that is, some“90s”wouldbecome“9s”.Moreover,we coulduse facilitate9s tobecome1sby taking the lead in

initiatives.Thisway, thepower lawdistributionofeffortwouldbesmoothed.Hopefully, suchoutcomewouldhavemultiple

positive results in communities: reduce the common feelings of frustration and guilt of core members and occasional

contributors, reduce the strongdependencyon the coremembers (whichmayendanger the community sustainability), and

helptodistributetheworkload.

Figure2:PowerLawdistributionandamoreequallydistributedworkload.

The current version of Teem is an application built precisely with these aims in mind, especially focusing on reducing the

“invisible wall” height,making CBPP communitiesmore inclusive and facilitate their growth and sustainability. The next

subsectionsdescribethetoolandhowitsdesignandapproachhelpcommunitiestosolvetheseissues.


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1. AvisualwaytodecreasetheInvisibleWall.

Therefore,TeemaimstoincreasecollaborationinCBPPcommunitiesbyreducingtheinvisiblewallbetweenthosecontributing

(core members and occasional collaborators) and those not (users or readers). After multiple experimentation with CBPP

communities,wehavedevelopedavisualwaytodothat, i.e. facilitating thesharingofcommunityprojects throughavisual

interaction.Projectorganizerscanmakeimagesofprojectsintheircommunities,inordertosharethemwithnewpeoplewho

could join the effort. Communities have a commonworkspacewith collaboration tools such as a collaborative editor (like

GoogleDocsorEtherPad)andachat,whereprojectscanlistthosetasksthatneedahelpinghandtoengagenewpeople.Teem

is available both as a web3 and a mobile4 application. Some interactions, such as easy sharing through photos or getting

notificationupdates, fitbetter inanapp formobiledeviceswhileothers like fast collaboration in textdocumentsareeasier

withdesktopdevices.Thefollowingsubsectionsexplainindetailthemainfeaturesofthetool.

3 Teem web application. https://teem.works

4 Teem mobile application in Google Play. http://tiny.cc/teemapp


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SharingprojectsinavisualwayWe have observed in multiple experiments that sharing information to facilitate the collaboration of new members is

something really difficult. Some of the last prototype refinements have tried to build an interface to facilitate this

communication among active members and members willing to start participating. Our last iteration aims to target this

problembyhelpingcommunityorganizerstosharetheircommunityprojectsinavisualway.Bytakingoruploadingapictureof

theiractivities, theycanadd theirprojects to theappecosystem. In thegalleryofprojects that theappprovides (Figure3),

userslookingforinterestingprojectstoparticipatecandiscover,learnandjointhoseprojects.

Figure3:Teemdesktopexplorationview

SocialSharing&IntegrationCommunication,collaborationandcontributionaredonenowadaysusingawideecosystemoftools,farfromtheapproachofa

singletoolforallpurposes.Accordingly,toolsspecializedinaconcreteproblemthatcanbeintegratedwithexistingtoolsare

moreeasilyadopted,thanthosethattrytodotoomanythings,orthatarenotpreparedtointeractinadiversetoolecosystem.


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Teempurpose is tohelpcommunities togetpeople involved.However,at thebeginning,aswithevery tool,Teemdoesnot

have a wide and diverse community of users participating. Thus, we have integrated Teem with the most common

communicationandsocialtoolssuchasemail,TwitterorFacebook.Thankstothismultipleintegration,organizerscansharethe

projectstheyareproudof,orthoseforwhichtheyneedahelpinghand.Thisfacilitatesthediscoveryofinterestingprojectsto

potential contributors using their usual networks. It also help communities to bootstrap collaboration in a smooth and not

disruptiveway.CommonersmayjointhecommunitiestheysupportinTeemwhentheyarewillingtoparticipate,meanwhile,

theycouldreceiveupdatesthroughtheirusualsocialnetworks.

Figure4:Sharingprojectoptionsatcreation

CollaborationworkspaceTeem’scollaborationworkspaceisacentralpieceofthetool,andhasbeenakeyobjectofresearchandexperimentsduringthe

project. The selection of communication and collaboration tools has been designed to fit the needs and culture of CBPP

communitiesandtheirmembers.Acollaborativeeditor,agroupchatanda listofneedswhichcanbe integratedwithin the

collaborative documents are the key tools of collaboration and communication provided to coordinate the work of the

communityprojects.


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● Pad:The“pad”orreal-timecollaborativedocumentisintendedtobeusedtocoordinateeachcommunityproject.In

suchdocument,organizerscansharetheinformationneededtostartcollaboratingintheproject, itscurrentstatus

andwhathastobedone.Linkstootherresourcesandworkingdocumentsareencouraged,sinceTeempurposeisto

attractcollaborationandtocoordinateeachproject's'work.

● Chat:Achatisofferedforprojectrelated-conversations.Itcanbeusedtocoordinatetheworkaswellastosocialize

or introduce newparticipants. It also allows newcomers a direct and quickway for expressing doubts and feeling

included.

● Tasks: The need list is a list of “project needs” or tasks to be done. Needs can bemarked as resolved, and they

support comments forparticipants to sharehowtheycancontribute.Theneedsmaybeembedded in thepad, so

theycanbereadincontextandinanorganizedmanner.

All three tools are intended to facilitate the welcoming of new participants and the coordination in a CBPP-oriented way,

supporting both the voluntary (and sometimes irregular) participationof active contributors, andnewcomers looking to get

engagedintheprojects.Figure5showsthecollaborationworkspace,wherethepadand(embedded)needscanbeobserved.

Figure5,Teemcollaborativeworkspace.Padandneedsintegrationview.

2. TheHiddenPotential

Teemusesstate-of-the-arttechnologies(e.g.AngularJS,Docker,MongoDB)incombinationwithP2Pvalue’sframeworkSwellRT.

Thedifferent technologies used for thedevelopmentweredetailed inD3.3 andwill not be coveredhere. This provides the

followingcapabilitiestoTeem,whichsensiblyincreaseitspotential:


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● Teemisdecentralized:UnlikecentralizedservicessuchasFacebookorGoogleDocs,userscouldjoindifferentTeem

providerswhicharesmoothlyinteroperable,souserscantransparentlyinteractwithcommunitiesorusershostedby

differentprovidersoftheirown.

● Teemenablesreal-timecollaboration:Thechangesusersdointheapp,aresharedsimultaneouslywithalltheusers

interacting in the same view (similar to Google Docs or Etherpad). This way, Teem is a tool for synchronous and

asynchronouscollaboration.

● Teem is extensible: The text editor that Teemuses can integratewidgets such as voting, rating, video viewing or

others, in the shared text editor. One useful widget, the interactive tasks elements, is enabled and integrated by

default,butotherSwellRTwidgetscouldbeusedandintegratedintheTeemeditor.

2.SwellRT:DecentralizedReal-TimeCollaboration

Asalreadyintroducedpreviously,P2Pvaluehascreatedandlaunchedadevelopmentframeworktobuilddistributedreal-time

applications, SwellRT. During the 3rd year, this framework has been established as an independent robust product, with a

specialeffortonfacilitatingthedeveloper’swork.Nowadays,itisadeveloper-friendlyplatformthatfacilitatesthecreationof

modern real-time collaborative applications, which are decentralized and interoperable using modern protocols. Following

P2Pvalue’sOpenApproach,theprojectisfullyfree/opensourcesoftwareanddevelopedintheopen5.

5 https://github.com/P2Pvalue/swellrt


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This work has its origins on the Apache Foundation free/open source software project Apache Wave, which P2Pvalue re-

engineeredandbuiltupon.AnindicatorofSwellRT’ssuccessisthattheactualApacheWaveprojecthasaskedustoadoptthe

SwellRTcodebase,discarding theirowncodebase.Theconversationshaveevolvedpositively,andafter someadaptationsof

SwellRTcode,themainApacheWavedevelopersagreetothemerge,andthefinalofficialvotewillbeheldbySeptember28th,

2016.

Themostremarkablefeaturesdevelopedthis3rdyearareenumeratedandexplainedbelow.

● NewAPIforJavascriptintegration:AnewAPIhasbeendevelopedtofacilitateJavaScriptdevelopment.Withtheuse

ofnativeproxyobjects,JavaScriptdeveloperswillbeabletousereal-timemutableSwellRTobjects.Thismakesthe

useofSwellRTmorenaturaltouseinthatlanguage.

● WidgetsandannotationsAPI:TheAPI fordevelopingcollaborativeeditorextensionshasbeenupdatedtosupport

thedevelopmentofthoseextensions inawebnativemanner.ThepreviousAPImadeuseofGWTcode,which isa

technologythatiscurrentlylosingtractionandthatrequiresJavaknowledge.(Figure6)

Figure6:SwellRTcollaborativeeditorwithataskwidget.

● Webeditorpresence:Thepresencecapabilitiesofthecollaborativeeditorhasbeensensiblyimproved,enablingthe

perceptionofconcurrentparticipationwithintheeditor.

● Renovatedfederationinfrastructure:WithintheframeofaGoogleSummerofCode2016internshipthattheproject

obtained6, the open standard protocol used for federation among SwellRT servers has been replaced. The change

helpedtosolvemultipleproblemsthatthepreviousprotocolXMPPpresented,andtoadoptamorerobustandstate-

of-the-arttechnologyforthispurposes,Matrix7.

● Referencecollaborativeeditorwith latestwebtechnologies:Areference implementationofacollaborativeeditor

using latest Angular 2 has been acquired and open-sourced as a proof of concept of the potential of SwellRT for

collaborativeapplicationandeditorsdevelopment8.

6 The Google’s grant-holder and developer intern was Waqee Khalid: https://github.com/Waqee/ 7 Matrix. https://matrix.org

8 JetPad. https://github.com/devialab/swellrt-pad


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● Improvement of the documentation: The documentation has been sensibly improved to facilitate adoption and

exploitation.Itispublishedinapublicwikiatgithub.com9.

● SwellRTdevelopmentcontest:AdevelopmentcontesttodevelopSwellRT-basedapplications,with6000€inprices,

waslaunched.Ithelpedtoincreasevisibilityamongfreesoftwaredevelopers.

● Landingpage:AnewlandingpagehasbeenlaunchedwithanimprovedmessagetoimprovetheimpactofSwellRT

amongdevelopers(seeFigure7).

● Productdesign,brandingandcommunication:ResearchhasbeenconductedtoidentifyhowSwellRTcanbebetter

introducedto thedevelopercommunity, inorder tobeestablishedasamaturevaluable independentproject.The

brandinghasalsobeenimprovedfordisseminationandproductimage.

Figure7:SwellRTLandingpage.

9 https://github.com/P2Pvalue/swellrt/wiki

Documents

TECHNO-SOCIAL PLATFORM FOR SUSTAINABLE ......facilitating the developer’s work. Nowadays, it is a developer-friendly platform that facilitates the creation of modern real-time collaborative