Big Data Analytics: Crowdsourcing for better mobile service

Thomas Friedman gave me the idea.

I was listening to my audible copy of “Thank You for Being Late” by Thomas Friedman while on my morning run. He was talking about Github and how it was enabling accelerated development of software through community efforts. This started me thinking about how GitHub can improve mobile communications in the Philippines.

Can we use crowdsourcing to modify a Github app and deploy that to measure the signal strength and internet bandwidth at wherever location the user happens to be in?

With support from our community, our best volunteer brains can adapt an existing Github project like SignalTracker project for our purpose. Once we have the modified SignalTracker, our social media volunteers can help to spread the word and get more volunteers to download, install, and run the app wherever they are in the Philippines.

The mobile app will collect the signal strength, bandwidth, carrier network name, date and time, frequency and more importantly, the GPS geo location coordinates. The GPS data will let us know the location of where the measurement was taken from. The data will be saved on a Google public cloud storage where the public will be given free access to download and do their own analysis.

Our goal is to get better mobile internet service. Think of it like a “Waze for mobile signal and internet traffic monitoring.” Our project’s collected data will be made publicly available. It will enable data scientists like us to publish works based on these. The published visual infographics will help consumers decide which networks they should subscribe to, based on the signal and bandwidth available in their areas of interests.

Telcos can use the aggregated data for planning future cell sites to help improve and maximize their service to ROI ratios. It will be carrier neutral. And instead of being at odds, the public can be the telcos’ ‘best friends’ by helping them monitor their current coverage and bandwidth capabilities.

One other benefit is to tie it up with Project NOAH or its successor. Each user of the mobile app can broadcast their location in times of emergencies and Project NOAH can pick these up to identify areas where people congregate. This isn’t new. It has been done in Nepal ( Using Big Data in a Crisis) and Haiyan.

We will need great mobile app developers that can work from the Github repository of Signal Tracker. Convert it to our purpose, package and host it on Google Play. We will need UI experts to design the graphical user interface and make it cognitively easy for other volunteers to install and run the app. Less is the goal here.

We will need social media gurus and bloggers to help spread the word. We need advocates for a better internet to volunteer and load the app on to their mobile phones. And then keep on checking the signal strength regularly. We will need data scientists and visual artist to convert the data/ numbers into a story that will help inform (light the way) and inspire the carriers into action.

If you have the skills, comment and let us know how to get in touch with you. If you have friends with the skills, please help by sharing this article with them. If you have an android phone, comment as well. When the app is ready, we will notify you all.

A big thank you to the volunteers we have now that is making this possible: Paul Sydney Orozco, Fleire Castro, Tzar Umang, and Melbourne Baldove.