This post is via my Paul B. Hartzog blog, but I realized that I should’ve posted it here, so here goes….
I recently read The Rise of Crowdsourcing over at Wired (the author, Jeff Howe, has a blog on the topic at http://www.crowdsourcing.com).
The article mentions that iStockphoto (cheap stock photography via the Internet) has obliterated the “future for professional stock photography.” (Similarly, Clay Shirky noted way back when that blogs “are such an efficient tool for distributing the written word that they make publishing a financially worthless activity.”)
But more importantly, the Wired article discusses the rise of R&D networking. For example, InnoCentive matches problems and problem-solvers: “The strength of a network like InnoCentive’s is exactly the diversity of intellectual background…. We actually found the odds of a solver’s success increased in fields in which they had no formal expertise.”
Now, just this year, Chevy attempted its own kind of crowdsourcing, allowing website visitors to apply their own text input over Chevy Tahoe footage to create-your-own-commercial. What they got was a barrage of anti-pollution, anti-accident, and just-about-anti-anything creations. (See them at YouTube: http://youtube.com/results?search=chevy+tahoe). One participant even launched a website where you can rate the videos).
Using existing mass media images to twist, mock, refute, subvert, or as wikipedia more politely says “produce negative commentary about itself” is called “culture jamming.”
Umberto Eco calls this “semiological guerrilla warfare” and supports “action which would urge the audience to control the message and its multiple possibilities of interpretation.” (from Travels in Hyperreality).
But what happens when the culture jammers actually want to continue and extend the media in question?
Well, last year Wired ran this story about some Star Trek fans who make their own episodes, which eventually culminated in this article at The New York Times. (See the fan-vids: http://www.newvoyages.com/, http://www.ussintrepid.org.uk/, http://www.hiddenfrontier.com/, and http://www.starshipexeter.com/).
The fans are saying, look, if we can’t get what we want on television, the technology is out there for us to do it ourselves…. It has become so popular that Walter Koenig, the actor who played Chekov in the original “Star Trek,” is guest starring in an episode, and George Takei, who played Sulu, is slated to shoot another one later this year.
Now the Star Trek franchise has a real opportunity here that could be taken as a crowdsourcing lesson to other media producers (music, film, books, etc.). Here it comes:
Free the content!
Let the Star Trek fans take the initiative and spend the money to keep the interest-level going, crank out a studio movie once in a while, foster crossovers between shows, organize events, provide financial assistance, etc.
This is what Rebecca Blood calls “participatory culture,” and Clay Shirky “mass amateurization.”
The Pew Internet & American Life Project released this study which states that “57 percent of 12- to 17-year-olds online – 12 million individuals – are creating content of some sort and posting it to the Web.”
So if culture jams are the result of the appropriation of mass media images for negative commentary, then the same process used for positive purposes would result in culture preserves, no?
Kick out the preserves! ;-)
1. Alan on July 27, 2006 1:45 PM writes...
Hi Paul; why not marmalading? Sorry but as a brit by birth I still enjoy a marmalade toast with my coffee. I have been thinking about the crowdsoursing phenomena and also about the propensity of large numbers of individuals, who are willing to give much of their time to activities like wikapedia or many of the other activities that need volunteers/participants that gain no material compensation! When values were a much stronger part of the employee/employer relationship that might not have been the case. Today there is little love lost between those who make the money and those who work for them. The economic engine has become paramount in the attempt to survive an economy that make the bottom line the power broker. For many institutions that line has become the maker-breaker. Those who might have given their all to their employer a generation or two ago now are reluctant to give of themselves when they are often just another number that can be crunched at any moment. We all would rather give our all to that area in our lives that brings personal fulfillment! The shift away from material gain and recognition that personal fulfillment is an important objective appears to be gaining momentum on several levels. Many a top executive has moved from the board room to the classroom for a renewed sense of fulfillment and meaningful contribution to the wider community. What might have been considered to be a career path to my generation has been down graded to the position of a job to facilitate the mortgage payments and other personal needs. Work to live or live to work has become more than a catchphrase for the younger generation who know that “a working-stiff� might have had some tenure in the past but not any more. I wonder if those who are “culture jamming� belong to this shift. Alan.
Permalink to Comment2. Christian on July 28, 2006 9:57 AM writes...
I feel calling the Tahoe ad crowdsourcing a bit far-fetched.
Permalink to CommentThe Tahoe ad was an attempt at the latest marketing hype called "user generated content" (and a bad one at that). It was more about the act of building your own ad, conversing with the brand, having interaction with...yadayadayada then Chevy actually saying "We're tired of paying loadsa money to ad agencies, let's do some crowdsourcing!"
3. uasp.net on August 2, 2006 2:38 AM writes...
Nice,The fans are saying, look, if we can’t get what we want on television...
Permalink to Comment4. Ventus on August 23, 2006 10:07 AM writes...
Hello,
in the same concept, look at this website that I've just noticed http://cecrowdsourcing.blogspot.com/ This is a further step on the crowdsourcing as it aims to design and sale electronic products for the first time (it's hardware development and not software for this time). It looks promising but it's just started. I'd recommand you to join this community, who knows it can work and you can potentially earn money.
Permalink to Comment5. Carter Harkins on September 25, 2006 1:30 PM writes...
Great post. I've been examining podcasting in view of crowdsourcing and the participatory culture, wondering what that would look like. I have been disappointed that podcasting has become just another online push-marketing tool, another mass media vehicle, rather than realizing its full potential as a vehicle for many-to-many conversations, the way blogs, wikis and online forums have been. New technologies are making this sort of social, conversational interaction possible, and I look forward to seeing how these New Media cultures will shape emerging podcasting technologies. If anyone has thought about these things, or has written on it, please let me know!
Carter Harkins
Permalink to CommentInnertoob.com
carter at innertoob dot com
6. Carter Harkins on September 25, 2006 1:31 PM writes...
Great post. I've been examining podcasting in view of crowdsourcing and the participatory culture, wondering what that would look like. I have been disappointed that podcasting has become just another online push-marketing tool, another mass media vehicle, rather than realizing its full potential as a vehicle for many-to-many conversations, the way blogs, wikis and online forums have been. New technologies are making this sort of social, conversational interaction possible, and I look forward to seeing how these New Media cultures will shape emerging podcasting technologies. If anyone has thought about these things, or has written on it, please let me know!
Carter Harkins
Permalink to CommentInnertoob.com
carter at innertoob dot com
7. Carter Harkins on September 25, 2006 1:32 PM writes...
Great post. I've been examining podcasting in view of crowdsourcing and the participatory culture, wondering what that would look like. I have been disappointed that podcasting has become just another online push-marketing tool, another mass media vehicle, rather than realizing its full potential as a vehicle for many-to-many conversations, the way blogs, wikis and online forums have been. New technologies are making this sort of social, conversational interaction possible, and I look forward to seeing how these New Media cultures will shape emerging podcasting technologies. If anyone has thought about these things, or has written on it, please let me know!
Carter Harkins
Permalink to CommentInnertoob.com
carter at innertoob dot com