Standing on the Shoulders of Their Peers: Success Factors for Massive Cooperation Among Children Creating Open Source Animations and Games on Their Smartphones

TL;DR

This paper explores the success factors of an online community platform where children share and remix animations and games created on smartphones, emphasizing cooperation, motivation, and parental considerations.

Contribution

It identifies key requirements for engaging children and parents in a creative, cooperative online environment for sharing open source animations and games.

Findings

Children are motivated by entertaining friends.

Cooperation and learning from peers are crucial success factors.

Parental involvement influences platform engagement.

Abstract

We developed a website for kids where they can share new as well as remixed animations and games, e.g., interactive music videos, which they created on their smartphones or tablets using a visual "LEGO-style" programming environment called Catroid. Online communities for children like our website have unique requirements, and keeping the commitment of kids on a high level is a continuous challenge. For instance, one key motivator for kids is the ability to entertain their friends. Another success factor is the ability to learn from and cooperate with other children. In this short position paper we attempt at identifying the requirements for the success of such an online community, both from the point of view of the kids as well as of their parents, and at finding ways to make it attractive for both.