| The rapid adoption of mobile phones has enabled a new sensing paradigm - participatory sensing - where individuals act as sensors by using their mobile phones for data collection. Participatory sensing relies on the sensing capabilities and networking support of mobiles phones along with the spatial and temporal coverage and interpretive abilities provided by the individuals that operate them. If successfully coordinated, participants involved in data collection can open up new possibilities in understanding social and physical processes relevant to the interests of individuals, groups, and communities. Realizing a vision of sensing that is widespread and truly participatory poses critical technology challenges. This work details a mechanism to recruit individuals to perform particular data collections. The recruitment framework considers the following elements to select data collectors: (a) the availability of participants in terms of activity, spatial, and temporal contexts, (b) the reputation of participants as data collectors, and (c) the resource and incentive costs associated with participants to enable and motivate contributions. A series of deployments related to sustainability are used to show the utility of the recruitment service. |
