Artificial intelligence annotation through gamification

A method of enticing users to label virtual reality objects for the purpose of training an AI system to recognize the objects, comprising the steps of:

• broadcasting a data stream over a network to a plurality of computing devices, the data stream including, in a virtual game environment, objects or entities recognizable by a user,
• the computing devices displaying, on display devices connected to respective said computing devices, the objects or entities included in the data stream;
• enabling users, in response to display of one of the objects or entities included in the data stream, to play video games by manipulating or utilizing computer input devices to select and label, in a manner consistent with the virtual game environment, the displayed objects or entities;
• communicating, via the network, labels selected by the user for the displayed object or entity from the computing devices to the AI system for use in teaching the AI system to identify the object or entity based on labels input by the users;
• upon selection of a label by a respective user, displaying a result, consistent with the virtual game environment, that rewards the respective user for carrying out the selection and labeling in order to entice the user into continuing to select and label displayed objects, and thereby train the AI system to recognize the displayed objects or entities included in said data stream and broadcast over the network.