Has crowdsourcing become a lazy cliché?
By Molly FlattCrowdsourcing is one of those concepts which inspires intense emotions, from idealism-fuelled evangelism through to sneering cynicism. Often trumpeted as one of the triumphs of World 2.0, a utopia of democratic crowd wisdom that foregrounds the creativity of the little guy, it has captured the imagination of brands and organisations big time, from the sublime to the banal.
via jcbehm @ Flickr
There are multiple case studies just from the past few week. Google’s launch of the Nexus One. Implemenation of Iwantoneofthose.com’s payment system. Ushahid’s Swift River project using the public to keep information channels open in an emergency or in non-democratic countries. The redesign of the website for the City of Austin, Texas. Setting the price of the new Duo electric car from Meyers Motors.
However, an equally vocal faction consider crowdsourcing to be an ineffective and unrigorous way of innovating, which has become a cheap and easy shortcut for lazy brands.
As John Klossner recently put it (in a post claiming that Mr Smith Goes to Washington is the first example of crowdsourcing on film - nice - I always think of Spartacus):
Crowdsourcing can be considered a way of doing a project cheaply. Instead of bringing in experts to look at the problem, you let “the crowd” solve it. For someone with professional expertise who makes a living at this, where is the attraction? Crowdsourcing might allow for the discovery of an unthought-of idea — kind of like winning the lottery — but how do you guarantee that the most qualified individuals will participate? Is it crowdsourcing? Or a pie bake-off?
Or in the glorious words of professional curmudgeon Charlie Brooker:
TV advertising used to work like this: you sat on your sofa while creatives were paid to throw a bucket of shit in your face. Today you’re expected to sit on the bucket, fill it with your own shit, and tip it over your head while filming yourself on your mobile. Then you upload the video to the creatives. You do the work; they still get paid.
In Forbes.com, Dan Woods recently wrote a well constructed piece, based on Netflix’s recent algorithm crowdsourcing project, warning that the word itself is misleading. He posits that it is still the exceptional individuals in the herd which drive the real innovation and discovery.
So surely brands need to be crowdsurfing rather than crowdsourcing - not getting bogged down in the lowest common denominator but finding ways to help the really exciting stuff to rise to the top?
This reminds me of Francesco D’Orazio’s presentation for WOM UK back in November, when he described Face’s approach to research. They combine a wide initial crowdsourcing approach with a more focused co-creation stage that gathers a select few opinion leaders to test the best ideas and nail down specific proposals for activity - meaning you get both individual and group thinking, bottom and top down structures. It makes sense.
There are plenty of crowdsourcing communities which promote quality as well as quantity and ensure members are rewarded in a way consummate with their expertise - check out Blur Designs or Bush Green. But it’s also true that ‘crowdsourcing’ is rapidly becoming a media buzzword applied with dubious strategy or integrity. It will be interesting to see whether ‘the crowd’ become more reluctant to share their insights and graft, and how creative brands become in filtering those opinions and making them an effective part of their feedback loop in a way that engages, but doesn’t exploit, the public.
What do you think? Have been part of a crowdsourcing project and how did you feel? How do you think the practice will evolve and who is doing it best, and worst, right now?
