Chapter 3 -Crowdsourcing
Folksonomy - A form of
Crowdsourcing
“The act of taking tasks traditionally
performed by an employee or
contractor, and outsourcing it to a
group of people or community (the
crowd), in the form of an ‘open
call’.” - Wikipedia
In its simplest terms, crowdsourcing
is a “distributed problem-solving and
production model” one which often
relies on an active community in
order to be successful.
Examples of Crowdsourcing
Wikipedia
Key Terms and Concepts
1. Amateur - A person without
formal training or professional
credentials in a specific field.
2. Brief - A document giving essential
information concerning the problem
that needs solving.
3. Creative - A term used in the
advertising industry to describe
people who produce creative
products.
4. Collaboration - An online
community working together on a
single project.
5. Collective intelligence - A shared
intelligence from the collaboration
of many individuals.
6. Community - A social network of
individuals who interact through a
specific medium.
7. Crowd - A large undefined group
of people made up of many online
individuals.
8. Crowdsourcing - Taking a job
traditionally performed by a
professional and distributing it to an
undefined, generally large group of
people in the form of an open call.
9.
History of Crowdsourcing
crowdsourcing also known as
• Technology commentator Jeff
collaborative tagging, social
Howe came up with the term in an
classification, social indexing or
article in Wired Magazine in 2006.
social tagging.
• The concept dates back to 1700s
10. Ideation - A process during
early editions of the Oxford English
which new ideas are created.
Dictionary were crowdsourced when
11. Intellectual property (IP) - Legal thousands of volunteers submitted
property rights over intangible entries on slips of paper that were
creations of the mind, both artistic compiled into a dictionary
and commercial.
• Another early example of
12. New agency model - The crowdsourcing is the Longitude
incorporation and use of Prize, an open contest run by the
crowdsourcing platforms to source British government in 1714. The aim
marketing and communications was to find a simple and practical
solutions. method for the precise
determination of a ship’s longitude,
13. Open Call - When a request is
something that had up to that point,
made for anyone to submit solutions
stumped experts.
to a problem.
Other Examples of
14. Open Source - In the context of
Crowdsourcing this is when a Crowdsourcing
cooperative activity is initiated and
1. Waze
voluntarily undertaken by members
of the public, not by a client or 2. McDonalds Burger Builder
crowdsourcer.
3. My Starbucks idea
15. Outsourcing - Work is conducted
outside of an organization by a 4. Lego
specific defined individual or group 5. Samsung
of people.
6. Lays
16. Spec work - Fully executed
creative work requested by 7. Pebble
crowdsourcing platforms that is not 8. Greenpeace
paid for upfront, and is only paid for
when the work is chosen or 9. Airbnb
accepted.
The “Rise of the Amateur”
17. User-generated - Various kinds
of media content, publicly available,
that are produced by end users.
18. Wiki - A simple website that can
be edited in real time by a number
of users.
19. Wisdom of the crowd - The
collective knowledge, opinion or
skills of a group of individuals rather
than a single expert used to solve a
problem.
When it comes to crowdsourcing, business ideas or product concepts,
amateurs are competing with and often funding as well.
professionals in fields ranging from Crowdsourcing can also connect
computer programming to the those who have business ideas with
sciences. These people are hobbyists those who can provide funding to
and enthusiasts who may not have get them off the ground.
the relevant professional
3. Communications ideas -
qualifications, but can possess talent
Crowdsourcing in a communication
and passion in any given field. This
sense is used primarily within the
devotion to a particular subject is
advertising and marketing industry.
ultimately what drives the
It involves the crowdsourcing of
crowdsourcing vehicle.
ideas for the communication of a
Kinds of Crowdsourcing brand message, advertising message
or value proposition. This could
1. Invention - Crowdsourcing is used
include the crowdsourcing of logo
to source ideas, often for new or
designs, televisions advertisement
existing product development. This
scripts or new marketing concepts in
means the community is tasked with
any shape or form.
creating ideas from scratch while
also improving on and ranking ideas. How Crowdsourcing Campaign is
Managed
2. Creation - New content is created,
owned and maintained by a 1. Centrally controlled - This is where
community on an already existing the process is centrally controlled by
platform. The crowd can also a guiding force that channels ideas
contribute finished work or just an and formalizes the entire process.
idea, allowing other members to
2. Community controlled - This
flesh out concepts.
works in an entirely opposite way.
3. Organization - Through this Here the community controls the
method crowdsourcing is used to process and the ultimate outcome.
create new content by organizing
already existing content. The
community is charged with ranking
information in terms of relevance
and popularity.

4. Prediction - Prediction aims to

predict trends by asking the
community to submit ideas and vote
for them.

How it Works in Business

1. Product development - The

crowd’s knowledge is used to
improve an existing product or
suggest new products.

2. Initiatives and new business –

Crowdsourcing is used to generate