Innovation Through Community Collaboration
Below is a concept that validates a vision that I had 15 years ago: The vision was that innovation will no longer be based on IP rights (intellectual property). Instead, inventions will emerge in an open, collaborative, non-secretive way. Of course this is an ideal world - as least for me. However, the concept of innovation ownership and the idea that 'real' innovation only shows up in the bellies of R&D labs, is rapidly fading. Read up below ...
Wikinomics is a new term for harnessing mass collaboration for innovation, growth and profit. The term was coined by Don Tapscott, author of "Paradigm Shift" and "The Digital Economy," and is the title of his newest book. Mass collaboration has created notable breakthroughs like Wikipedia, an encyclopedia with a million authors that's 12 times larger than Britannica; an operating system, Linux; and 150,000 open source applications projects. Mass collaboration means each is constantly updated, revised and corrected by unpaid volunteers. "It's an amazing thing how this organism brings out the antibodies to attack a virus," Tapscott says. The winds of mass collaboration are also changing the way corporations innovate. About five years ago, Tapscott points out, P&G was struggling and its market value had plunged. New CEO A.G. Lafley decided to open the company's R&D to outsiders, tapping their expertise to supplement P&G's staff scientists. Result: P&G is developing deep expertise in what Tapscott calls Wikinomics. "Rather than the 'Not Invented Here' syndrome, P&G has this thing called PFE: 'Proudly Found Elsewhere.' You'd think they'd be threatened by that, but in they actually encourage their researchers to go outside and look for innovations." P&G has even set up reward systems so that their researchers benefit from innovation occurring. They don't have to develop it themselves to reap the rewards. (TomPeters.com)
Read the full interview with Don Tapscott at Tom Peter's blog site. Especially note in the interview that a new approach to creating and/or aquiring innovation has emerged called Innocentive. InnoCentive® is a web-based community matching top scientists to relevant R&D challenges facing leading companies from around the globe. It provides an online forum enabling major companies to reward scientific innovation through financial incentives.