Technologists and science fiction writers have long envisioned a world where a seamless worldwide network of Internet-connected sensors could capture every event, action, and change on earth, giving us unprecedented real-time information about the state of the world. Such remote sensing and surveillance capabilities could easily have Orwellian consequences, but they can also empower citizens in new ways too.

Take the Berkeley-based “Common Sense” project, where an innovative group of researchers claims that a few simple modifications can transform an ordinary mobile phone into a powerful personal measurement instrument capable of sensing our natural environment and empowering collective action through everyday grassroots citizen science across blocks, neighborhoods, cities, and nations.

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