Tuesday, September 25, 2012

Crowdsourcing, angel or devil?

I decided to select the course "Social Networking" when I took the first lesson as it impressed me a lot.Professor Rosanna Chan taught us the definition of social networking and social media.I found I began to have access to some social networking sites like Weibo.com and Renren.com long long ago. From the lectures, I came to know the difference between social network and social networking------Social network is a social structure constructed by specific types of interdependency while social networking involves some action.

During the past two lectures, I'm interested in several topics. Among which is the concept of "Crowdsourcing".It was until lecture 2 that I came to know its meaning.Crowdsourcing means a corporate or an institute poses a problem to a crowd of users and get their ideas which can't be solved through computation.I still remember the description by Processor Chan that crowdsourcing is just the "stupid "computer can't do while only human can finish.

In lecture 2, a classmate introduced the famous site http://www.zhubajie.com/ which apparently a good example of crowdsourcing. People can publish all kinds of needs on the websites and all the users can offer a good solution to get the rewards.

Then I want to say that SougouInput is also a very good example nationwide.They collect the design of skins and the cell word libraries from all the internet users.This is also a very successful case of crowdsoucing.Try to imagine how can the professional designers design tens of thousands of skins in limited time.But with the strength of the masses,the skins of SougouInput are always in the update, and maybe the designs from some ordinary people happen to cater to the taste of the others.So,as I conclude,crowdsourcing contains the concept of collaborative innovation by the masses.

The following pictures show some skins designed by the ordinary online users instead of the company's designer, but they are still very cute and maybe a lot of  people will like them,and maybe one designer will never has the ability to design so many skins in different styles.




But as far as I'm concerned,crowdsourcing have pros and cons.The advantages are obvious and thus I want to express some opinions about its disadvantages.

First of all, crowdsourcing can cause a vicious competition.Some users don't care the cash rewards,but treasure the accumulation of experience value which will help them to be selected by more companies in the future.In order to get the chances being selected, they may be willing to do it at much lower price than the task really worth.And the kind of phenomenon will also affect other users online.

The second obvious disadvantage I think is that this kind of commercial operation mode will waste human resources.Everyone who is interested in this project may devote his time into finishing it,but in the end, the companies only need the best one, and no matter how good the others' idea is, they won't pay.Sometimes everyone is devoted in one project while the other tasks don't attract anyone.So I think crowdsourcing may sometimes cause bilateral lose.

Last but not the least, some volunteers may worry about the company's credit rating.They may think no one would know if the project sponsors never really give out the rewards to the participant or maybe they just give the rewards to the insider.

In general, crowdsourcing will not only help the corporate promote efficiency and cost savings but also give the customers diversified choices.if all the online networking sites can avoid the disadvantages and let it be a healthy operation environment, crowdsourcing can really be regarded as a new effective business model.
Posted by at

10 comments:

  1. UnknownSeptember 29, 2012 at 6:19 AM

    Hi, your concern about the disadvantages of cloudsourcing make sense and people need to be well aware of all these drawbacks when cloudsouring is becoming more and more popular. I think there should be some widely accepted rules and regulations to help cloudsourcing be a healthy and promising business model.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. UnknownNovember 19, 2012 at 10:00 AM

      Dear Ling,sorry for my late reply and thank you for your comment. First I want to say that maybe you misunderstood the key word of my blog.It's crowdsourcing instead of cloudsourcing.As you can easily get the knowledge from its literal meaning "crowd", crowdsourcing just means that a corporate or an institute poses a problem to a crowd of users and get their ideas which can't be solved through computation.The target is the crowd.It's not related to the cloud sharing or something. Thank you for your agreeing with my opinions about the disadvantages of crowdsourcing.Rules and regulations really should be adopted to regulate the online operation environment to make crowdsourcing play its greatest strengh.

      Delete
    2. UnknownNovember 20, 2012 at 12:41 AM

      Oops, I am sorry about mistyping crowdsourcing into cloudsourcing... I remembered one professor said CLOUD could be anything and maybe this made the concept always in my mind~ But this accidental event may suggest we could consider combining crowdsourcing and cloudsourcing together. It will be very interesting!

      Delete
  2. Lynn_MaoOctober 2, 2012 at 7:18 AM

    Hi Filly, nice standpoint! Never thought of this before. =)

    As for point two, I believe the participants have evaluated the cost and effect before they take part in. This basically apply to job hunting, project funding search situations as well. Since nothing is perfect, these concerns still are under accpetable threshold. To add some more, I do believe that somehow the tastes of the project starters also matter, as well as the quality of the work itself. This might cause the best work not being selected at the end, but that should still be a minority (=D). If the best work does stand out, it's still comparatively fair, standing from a viewer's point of view.

    For pt.3, try putting some faith to the society Filly. =) This could happen, but under the supervision of many eyes, cases like this can go directly to the realted departments in charge, if the policy is strict enough. grin~~

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. UnknownNovember 19, 2012 at 10:37 AM

      Hey Lynn, thank you for your constructive idea. For the point two, I agree that most participants may have evaluated the balance between their pay and harvest.So maybe the one who is willing to take the task can withstand the worst results that their time and efforts was wasted.I know maybe they don't care this, but to the whole online system and environment, it's just the fact that it's the wasting of human resources. People can't be chosen in one project may be assigned to do other tasks and there is no need for them to do the same thing at the same time for the same goal but the result is only one or two suggestions are adopted. As to the fairness part, I do agree with you that most time the outstanding works will stand out, but if some works which are almost the same level with the one be chosen, it's really a pity and wasting of human resources.If the participant listed second went to other projects which nobody online noticed, the participant and the corporate would both feel a pity. That's what I mean of bilateral loss in the blog. For the third point, I was just stating the potential risk objectively, I do believe that good mechanism will ensure the bilateral interests and that's exactly what I conclude in my blog in the end.

      Delete
  3. UnknownNovember 28, 2012 at 5:03 AM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  4. UnknownNovember 28, 2012 at 5:05 AM

    I share the same point of view about the advantages of crowdsourcing. It is a new business model, which increase everyone's productivity and benefit for both sides. In brief, it is a Pareto improvement. But I do not agree with the viewpoint of advantages of crowdsourcing( vicious competition,wasting human resources, company's credit rating). The first and third problems could easily solved with the improvement of institution, whilst the second one doesn't even exist.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. UnknownDecember 10, 2012 at 6:41 AM

      Thank you for your comments. For the disadvantages part, you think the three reasons are unfounded. But I think they are exactly the existing problems. An improving institution can really solve these problems, and that’s also my best expectation for the future. But right now, it actually exists. I have referred to many materials online and then analysed the disadvantages. When it comes to the waste of human resources, when many participants who are interested in one project strive to be the first to finish well on a certain project, and it’s unnecessary to make so many people working for the same task, don’t you think it’s a wasting of time and human resources to the whole crowdsourcing market? Other people can choose to do some less popular projects to win the rewards and at the same time the corporate will benefits.

      Delete
  5. AnonymousDecember 6, 2012 at 4:05 AM

    It is very good of you to combine crowdsourcing and social networking. Crowdsourcing take advantage of the wide spread use of social network. It breaks the money raising, a big issue, into numerical little parts. That is, maybe it's quite hard to convince someone to invest a big fortune, but people are so easily persuaded to pay small amount of money for trying new things. Actually, crowdsourcing is quite tricky since it perfectly takes use of the customer's mentality. Though it may be an effective way of raising money for entrepreneurs, crowdsourcing is still controversial due to the shortcomings you've mentioned.

    ReplyDelete
  6. UnknownDecember 11, 2012 at 2:25 AM

    Before reading your article, I didn't notice that crowdsourcing can cause a vicious competition and this kind of commercial operation mode will waste human resources. These drawbacks would bring a lot problems if we have no means on solution. Looking forward to deeper discussion on it.

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)