OpenShift Commons Paris - Choose Your Own Observability Adventure
'Anyone Can Edit': From Users to Produsers
1. creative in d u stries
„Anyone Can Edit‟:
From Users to Produsers
Dr Axel Bruns
ARC Centre of Excellence for Creative Industries and Innovation
Creative Industries Faculty
Queensland University of Technology
a.bruns@qut.edu.au – http://snurb.info/ – http://produsage.org/
creativeindustries.qut.com
2. creative in d u stries
The Produser
‒ No, it‟s not a typo…
‒ Produsers are involved in:
• user-led content production –
produsage
‒ In a variety of „Web 2.0‟
environments
(Image: http://flickr.com/photos/stabilo-boss/93136022/)
creativeindustries.qut.com
3. creative in d u stries
Beyond Production
‒ decline of the traditional value chain:
producer distributor consumer
(producer advised by consumer distributor consumer)
(customer-made ideas producer distributor consumer)
creativeindustries.qut.com
4. creative in d u stries
What‟s Happening Here?
‒ Trends towards:
• Prosumer (Alvin Toffler)?
• Citizen-Consumer (John Hartley)?
• Pro-Am Production (Charles Leadbeater & Paul
Miller)?
• User-generated products, created by a new
„Generation C‟ (Trendwatching.com)?
• Commercial interests „Harnessing the Hive‟ (J.C.
Herz)?
creativeindustries.qut.com
5. creative in d u stries
Beyond Products
‒ ‒
key assumptions about „products‟: but in the digital world:
• •
products exist in discrete versions, and the latest update is always immediately
available – e.g. open source, Wikipedia
producers decide when these are to be
released
• •
the distribution of products is controlled content is available for direct access
online – users become producers, and
(and controllable) by producers and
distributors, not by consumers the Net replaces the distributor
• consumers are relatively isolated – only • consumers join together in enthusiast
producers have access to the whole groups, interest groups, developer
community groups
• •
the core business lies in the sale of the core business lies in providing
copyrighted products value-added services around freely
available content
creativeindustries.qut.com
6. creative in d u stries
A New Value Chain?
(as producer)
produser
content content
(as consumer)
creativeindustries.qut.com
7. creative in d u stries
Common Characteristics
‒ shared across these environments:
• Open Participation, Communal Evaluation – the community as a whole, if
sufficiently large and varied, can contribute more than a closed team of
producers, however qualified
• Fluid Heterarchy, Ad Hoc Meritocracy – produsers participate as is appropriate to
their personal skills, interests, and knowledges; this changes as the produsage
project proceeds
• Unfinished Artefacts, Continuing Process – content artefacts in produsage
projects are continually under development, and therefore always unfinished;
their development follows evolutionary, iterative, palimpsestic paths
• Common Property, Individual Merit - contributors permit (non-commercial)
community use of their intellectual property, and are rewarded by the status
capital
creativeindustries.qut.com
8. creative in d u stries
Produsage
‒ emerging in various domains:
• open source software • multi-user gaming
∘ e.g. The Sims, Everquest,
development
• online publishing Second Life, Spore
• media sharing and creative
∘ blogs
practice
∘ open news – e.g. Slashdot,
∘ e.g. Flickr, ccMixter,
Indymedia, OhmyNews
YouTube, Jumpcut,
• knowledge management
Current.tv
∘ wikis – e.g. Wikipedia
• reviews and viral marketing
∘ social bookmarking – e.g.
∘ e.g. Epinions, IgoUgo
del.icio.us, digg
• automatic aggregation
∘ geotagging – e.g. Google
∘ Google, Amazon, Technorati
Earth, Frappr
creativeindustries.qut.com
9. creative in d u stries
Produsage
‒ beyond production:
• „anyone can edit‟ – users become producers of content
• outcomes are no longer distinct products – they are temporary
artefacts of a continuing process
• usage and production are increasingly, inextricably intertwined
• strict distinctions between producers, distributors, and
consumers no longer apply
• a new “Generation C” of content produsers?
this is produsage
(dt. Produtzung)
creativeindustries.qut.com
10. creative in d u stries
Breaking the Chains
commercial / non-profit
Produsage Environment
harvesting of user-
(populated by produsers) generated content
content
(e.g. The Sims,
development space
Wikipedia on CD-ROM)
set up by
community or commercial / non-profit
company to services to support
harbour produsage produsage
(e.g. Wikimedia (e.g. Red Hat,
Foundation; Google; SourceForge)
SourceForge)
valuable, often
commercial-grade
content is created
initial IP
commercial activities by users
contributions from
themselves, harnessing the hive
individuals, the
(e.g. support services,
public domain, or
consultancies, content sales)
commercial sources
collaborative, iterative, evolutionary, palimpsestic
user-led content development
creativeindustries.qut.com
11. creative in d u stries
Collective Intelligence
‒ Implications of produsage:
• emergent community structures?
• creative potential – grassroots, vernacular creativity?
• (e-)democratic potential?
• new applications for collective intelligence?
• sustainability of voluntary labour?
• commercial approaches
∘ JC Herz: „harnessing the hive‟
∘ how far removed from exploitation (i.e. hijacking the hive)?
• intellectual property issues?
• trust, authority, responsibility, liability?
creativeindustries.qut.com
12. creative in d u stries
creativeindustries.qut.com
(http://www.research.ibm.com/visual/projects/history_flow/capitalism1.htm)
13. creative in d u stries
Produser Economics
‒ Economic potential:
• ambiguous response by affected industries:
∘ opposition: e.g. software industry, journalism industry
∘ interest: e.g. tourism, computer games,advertising, product design
• cheap workforce for commercial producers
• but also post-Fordist Pro-Am production/produsage models
• Important inputs to process and product innovation
• increasing focus on creativity and innovation in international business
development
∘ e.g. move from „made in China‟ to „created in China‟
creativeindustries.qut.com
14. creative in d u stries
(http://freebeer.org/blog/archives/134)
creativeindustries.qut.com
15. creative in d u stries
Intellectual Property
‒ Ambiguous relation of produsage to IP:
• innovative use of new IP licences (e.g. Creative Commons)
• complex IP relationships in massively multi-produser environments (e.g.
Wikipedia)
• participants not necessarily aware of legal rights and obligations
• conflicted response from established industries
∘ both “Rip. Mix. Burn.” and p2p persecution
∘ both take down notices and YouTube advertising
• potential stifling of produser innovation by heavy-handed IP legislation
∘ potential economic impact
∘ China‟s growth helped by lax IP enforcement
creativeindustries.qut.com
16. creative in d u stries
creativeindustries.qut.com
(http://jpgmag.com/issues/19/full)
17. creative in d u stries
Political Implications
‒ Towards a post-industrial politics?
• growing effect of produser news on political process
∘ towards more dialogue and deliberation,
∘ or more argument and conflict?
• rear-guard battles by governments and news organisations against
citizen journalists – but not only in authoritarian regimes
• conflict between alternative and mainstream media coverage
∘ e.g. Howard Dean 2004, Australian federal election 2007, Obama and McCain 2008
• digital divide opening between traditional audiences and new produser-
citizens?
Is it possible to harness produsage to support a move of citizens
from being a passive audience for to being active produsers of
democracy?
creativeindustries.qut.com
18. creative in d u stries
Viral Marketing
Axel Bruns
Senior Lecturer
ARC Centre of Excellence for Creative Industries and Innovation
Creative Industries Faculty
Queensland University of Technology
Brisbane, Australia
a.bruns@qut.edu.au
http://snurb.info/
http://produsage.org/
http://gatewatching.org/
Blogs, Wikipedia, Second Life, and Beyond:
From Production to Produsage (Peter Lang, 2008)
Uses of Blogs, eds. Axel Bruns and Joanne Jacobs (Peter Lang,
2006)
Gatewatching: Collaborative Online News Production (Peter
Lang, 2005)
creativeindustries.qut.com