"EcoChange" App

Inspiration

We initially wanted to develop an app to motivate users to do environmentally sustaining tasks, and we thought that Duolingo did a fantastic job at implementing this. They used a minimalist design, easy to use interface, as well as friendly competition in the form of global leaderboards.

We also researched and found an app called Mistplay, which rewards users with giftcards they exchange with virtual currency they obtain through playing numerous video games.

We thought that it would be interesting if we combined these 2 ideas and created a unique app that revolved around rewarding motivation, and a good cause.

What it does

For this hackathon, we chose to design a solution for Persona 2: Joe’s community. Our app is called EcoChange, and it is a innovative application where users are able to complete tasks that help out environments and communities to earn awesome prizes as well. EcoChange has a Daily and Weekly quest system where users are assigned with doing activities such as quick walks, cleaning trash, and watering plants. Once they complete these quests, they are rewarded with EcoCoins, our virtual currency. The users are then able to exchange these EcoCoins for prizes like giftcards. Apart from this, EcoChange also includes guides and information about topics like plants, animals, and climate, and provides environmental tips for the user. EcoChange also contains a friends system where you can add and compete with friends and users around the world, through a leaderboard system with rankings that also reward the user with EcoCoins.

EcoChange is able to help out Joe's community by providing the users with an interactive, innovative, and creative way to help out the environment. Due to the large population of the community, an app like this could really benefit. Each person can complete some small tasks, but gradually these interactions accumulate to something very big and impressive, that can potentially save their community from climate change.

How we built it

We decided to use Qoom to build an interactive website to display our ideas for EcoChange. We implemented HTML, CSS, and some JavaScript to make the website as aesthetically pleasing and convenient to use.

For the Video Submission, we used WonderShare Filmora Pro X for all the editing.

We also built a small prototype for our EcoChange app using BuildFire, a software where users are able to design and develop their own apps and include many unique features.

Challenges we ran into

The main challenges we had were not with the code, but with the idea of our app and how it would realistically function in our society. We pinpointed numerous flaws and discussed them together to see if we could potentially come up with some solutions to solve them. One issue we had was how we would motivate people to even use our app. We first tried to implement collectibles such as badges and shiny achievements as a method of motivation, but we quickly realized that these virtual rewards had little to no significance to a person at all. So we decided to use money as a form of motivation. However, this would create another issue: Users abusing our software to easily earn the money. Instead of using AI, we thought that human moderation and verification would be more ideal to prevent this sort of situation from occurring, especially in a small community such as Joe's.

Another issue was how we would obtain this so called "money" in the first place. Technically, we could ask for loans to get started, and then include ads and a premium account system as means of producing stable amounts of income, which we can funnel into our giftcards.

Finally, unlike Duolingo, Climate Change is much different from learning languages, and so solving Climate Change may be difficult to motivate users, as it stretches into a much broader and global category that users feel may not be as significant to them or the environment. This also ties into what source of motivation we chose to use for EcoChange, which we eventually settled on money.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

This hackathon provided us with many challenges, but we are very proud that we were able to overcome all of them, considering that this is our very first Hackthon among all of us. We were able to diligently collaborate together to discuss ideas and implement them in Qoom. We brainstormed issues and flaws and provided solution to said flaws. We also effectively designed a nice website and app in such a short period of time, which we thought showed initiative.

Overall, we are very satisfied with our final product, and had a blast at our very first Hackathon, and hope to attend more in the the future!

What we learned

Using Qoom for Web Development
Researching advanced uses for HTML, CSS, and Javascript
Learning a bit about DCP, although we were unable to implement it in our final project, we still learned something new.
Learned how to use BuildFire to create some very effective prototypes for apps.
Improved our coding skills as well as critical thinking, problem solving, and creativity

What's next for "EcoChange" App Rough Draft

In the future, if in one way or another, our idea proves to show a lot of potential, we may possibly try to actually implement this into the market. It would be quite a challenging and ambitious task, but with help and time, it is entirely possible!