Is crowdsourcing an industry? or just a tool that spans all industries?

If crowdsourcing isn’t an industry, what is it?

What difference does such a distinction make?

Wolfgang - Thanks for addressing this. I'll have to give credit to Matt Johnston from uTest for first voicing this interesting faux pas.

When articulated correctly, there's no way crowdsourcing could be an industry. Crowdsourcing is a work process, that spans across all industries. It would be like calling freelancing an industry.

Crowdsourcing doesn't manufacture one single product, but rather it's a management process stuffed into current systems to enhance the output of various products.

I'll try & get our talented industry veteran, David Alan Grier, in to voice his thoughts.

-David

As a newcomer to the field (I just signed on as the editor here at The Daily Crowdsource) I have to admit that I never really thought about this distinction. I definitely agree that it would be a misnomer to call crowdsourcing an industry. I think crowdsourcing is so often referred to as an industry because of its novel status. Its hard for people to get past that novelty to the realization that, at its core, crowdsourcing is essentially an extremely versatile tool.

Lots of companies use ovens in their production pipeline, from small bakeries to multinational pharmaceutical companies, yet I've never heard anyone refer to them collectively as an oven industry (that would be the group of companies that actually makes the ovens). The oven is just one of the methods they use to achieve a certain output. Crowdsourcing is just that, a method used to achieve a certain output.

David and I were just talking and he mentioned the need for an alternative word. Personally, the more I think about it the more I feel that even another word used in the same grammatical constructions will risk forcing crowdsourcing into a box it doesn't quite fit into. I think that its not only the word industry that needs to be changed, but the association in people's minds between crowdsourcing and industry.

This is Alek Felstiner, the author of the article to which you linked in your post.

I believe I understand your concern around lumping a bunch of processes together into an "industry" and then ascribing to it various characteristics. You are of course quite right that many companies use crowdsourcing to solve problems, and they do so in different industries, in different ways.

But I don't see the danger in referring to the crowdsourcing industry, as long as you're actually referring to the firms that provide crowdsourcing services & support. That is how I used the term in the piece you linked.

I don't think it strains the imagination to contemplate the possibility that a management process can be made into a product. There is certainly a "subcontracting industry," despite the fact that one could also accurately describe subcontracting as a management process.

Of course the companies that use crowdsourcing are not in the "crowdsourcing" industry. But there are a growing number of firms that deliver crowd labor, along with a variety of services that make crowd labor simple/palatable/safe. And those firms are making money by providing this service. They are in the crowdsourcing industry, regardless of what their clients happen to produce/provide.

Now, that doesn't make it any more accurate or appropriate to make sweeping generalizations, as you pointed out. And, of course, crowdsourcing can exist outside this industry, as a management process or a theoretical concept. But an industry does exist.

Hey Alex,

Thanks for the note. I appreciate your insight. The danger can come when all crowdsourcing services get lumped together. It would be like lumping quality freelancers with those simply trying to rip you off.

We're starting to see a separation between different types of crowdsourcing (mainly winner take all vs collaboration). uTest, Genius Rockets, Trada, etc... are all doing it.

There are such differences between crowdsourcing companies that labeling them within an industry could easily pigeonhole everyone into "design contest" assumptions. We're working on a way to show to the world there are many MANY more crowdsourcing solutions than simply design contests.

I've used the word "industry" to describe the crowdsourcing space in the past..whoops! I guess people are going to use the "i word" to mean a community of commercial organisations operating in a particular sphere or with some common interest.

You are right - it will never be an industry as soon as large organisations use crowdsourcing for their processes. For example you might regard P+G Connect as an example of crowdsourcing but you would never say Proctor & Gamble were in the "crowdsourcing industry."

However there is some sort of crowdsourcing community - there must be if there is a debate about what to call it.

stevebynghall wrote:


I definitely agree. There is something. But what? A medium, space, movement, process, community? I really like calling it a work process.

And your example is spot-on. P&G aren't in the "crowdsourcing industry," but rather, they use crowdsourcing to enhance certain processes.