Crowdsourcing's name implicitly recognizes its shortcomings and ready comparison to outsourcing, a reality that doesn't elude Jeff Howe in “The Rise of Crowdsourcing.”
“The new pool of cheap labor: everyday people using their spare cycles to create content, solve problems, even do corporate R & D,” Howe writes. "Distributed labor networks are using the Internet to exploit the spare processing power of millions of human brains.”
Concordia does it, the Gazette is trying to do it, CNN flaunts it (see photo), but do here's what matters: do crowds benefit from crowdsourcing?
From the startup band on myspace to the retired white coat at InnoCentive, it seems fair to say it again:
“The mainstream [is] relying increasingly on part-time, temporary and sub-contract work, and in the case of newspapers, this exposure means more freelance writers and looser contracts.” Employees then, have no social security, sub-standard wages and are easily dispensable once a project is completed. I think we'll see some strong online workers unions before long.
So the effects of crowsourcing and the Long Tail may favour corporations, but I think it’s also opened a door for social activists, radicals and communities to effectively mobilize:
The Independent Media Centre is an excellent example of journalistic crowdsourcing.
Live Journal Montreal is also awesome for community-based crowdsourcing.
Petition Online may help as well.These are just a few examples of crowdsourcing for the crowd.
That said, Howe's article ends on a telling note:
“This is what we were paying $2,000 for. But this one,” he says, “was authored by one of our Turkers.” I ask how much he paid. His answer: “Five dollars."
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