On Wednesday, the 6th of March, the first "Day of Phenology" took place at the ZAMG in Vienna. We have also been invited by one of our project partners from the "Naturkalender App".

Currently, the #CitSci2019 conference in Raleigh, NC is going on and we follow the workshops, sessions and comments via twitter from our SPOTTERON Citizen Science design office in Vienna, Europe. But since we always love to support Citizen Science, we decided spontanously to do another special for one project of any participant or group at the conference.

We are very happy to be featured in the new Citizen Sience 4.0 article by Maximilian Ueberham in the gis.Business magazine (Ausgabe 01/2019). After a short introduction about Citizen Science author Maximilian Ueberham presents Citizen Sience projects, including the SPOTTERON Citizen Science platform.

We are happy to announce the release of the new SPOTTERON version 2.6.0! The next SPOTTERON Update brings 3 new extension, available for all Citizen Science apps running on the SPOTTERON platform. In the following blog entry we are going to explain these new features and their function.

On the 25th of January 2019 the Vienna City Hall hosted the Vienna Ball of Sciences for the 5th time, held under the motto: “Waltz and Science". As Citizen Scientists from SPOTTERON it was a great pleasure, that we had been invited to film the event just as we did the year before.

Sometimes, Citizen Science contributions are happening long after the sun has set. To reduce the blinding effect of a smartphone display, we have included a new night mode option for all Citizen Science apps on the SPOTTERON platform.

Thanks for all the CitizenScience! We wish you a happy New Year's Eve and many more exciting #CitSci moments in the upcoming year. We have already new projects coming up, the first one about light pollution and Citizen Science will be ready in 1st of February. But for now, we are off until the end of first week of the new year - see you in 2019!

The next SPOTTERON Update brings 3 new extension for all Citizen Science apps on the platform. One of the new features are the upcoming "User Roles", part of SPOTTERON's data quality pack.

With the new SPOTTERON platform version 2.5 we bring two more highlights to all apps on the Citizen Science platform: First of all, the Offline Maps & Spots feature allows users to download map areas and spots on their phone for having them present, even when there is no internet connection available. This feature is a big improvement, specially for Citizen Science Apps, in which the main activity takes place often outdoors in the field where web connectivitiy is not always a given thing.

From 15th to 19th of October, the Citizen Science Summer School "Citizen Science in Theory and Practice" took place in "Grünau im Almtal", a small town in the south of Upper Austria. Grünau is particular famous for the KLF, the "Konrad Lorenz Reseach Station" where zoologist and Nobel Prize winner Konrad Lorenz studied animal behavior and became one of the founders of modern ethology. Not far from the research station, a whole week was dedicated to Citizen Science and many interesting workshops, sessions and collaboration teamwork took place.

Citizen Science often happens out in the field where network coverage can be weaker. That's why it can be especially helpful and pratical to pre-download map sections and save them locally on a smartphone for excursions and hiking trips.

On 6th & 7th of September 2018, the "Forum Citizen Science" took place in Frankfurt, Germany, organised by the german Citizen Science hub "Bürger schaffen Wissen".

Thanks for the many interesting submissions and your paticipation in the SPOTTERON Citizen Science contest for getting a free App in Europe! We are finally able to announce the winner (and a follow up project as second place) here on our Citizen Science blog:

All Citizen Science projects on the SPOTTERON platform can use all custom extensions on the platform without additional costs from the start.

Every two years, a big conference about Citizen Science takes place in an European Country - this time we travelled to Geneva in Switzerland, where the ECSA 2018 was happening.

From 3rd to 5th of June 2018, the ECSA Conference 2018 and the general assembly of the European Citizen Science Association takes place in Geneva, Switzerland. As members of ECSA and platform for Citizen Science Apps we for sure take part during the whole time.

During the "Long Night of Research" (Lange Nacht der Forschung) in Vienna Austria at the Museum of Natural History (NHM) we met with Irmgard Greilhuber from the Citizen Science project Mycodata by the Austrian Mycological Society ÖMG. Irmgard is presenting the project and how Citizen Scientists can participate by submitting observations of mushrooms and fungi.

We talked to Thomas Hübner from the Central Station for Meteorology and Geodynamics (ZAMG) during the "Long Night of Research" in the Museum of Natural History in Vienna, Austria about the new phenology Citizen Science project "Nature's Calendar" about the the 10 phenological seasons in the project and what Citizen Scientists can observe in the Citizen Science App for Android and IOS.

Not every citizen science project has the need for own custom smartphone apps. Starting with April 2018, we offer a light-weight SPOTTERON package for Citizen Science projects, which provides an innovative web tool for desktop browsers..

Since the European Geosciences Union EGU holds its anual meeting in Vienna, Austria, we took the opportunity to catch up with Crowdwater, a  Science project about hydrology and water levels of rivers, soil moisture and stream spotting, running on the SPOTTERON Citizen Science platform.