Competing with or Against Crowds

March 26, 2018

Read The Full Prompt

In this module we have examined how firms can leverage digital technologies to harness the power of collective intelligence from the crowds to create value and capture value. For this assignment you have three options:

1 – Pick one industry where no firms have leveraged crowds, and come up with a crowd-based business model that may potentially transform the industry. Describe how you plan to create and capture value. Explain why the crowd will participate, and why your crowd-based model is better than the current model employed by the incumbents.

2 – Describe a company that is using crowds (external or internal) in an innovative manner. Describe how they incentivize participation and manage the crowd. What are the challenges? Describe how value creation and value capture occur, and the growth potential of this business.

3 – Companies often struggle with crowds as well. Describe failed crowdsourcing efforts and explain how and why the company failed. Given what you have learned in the course, what would you do differently?

Create an approximately 500-750 word post at d3.harvard.edu/platform-digit to make your contribution by 6pm on March 26. Please create appropriate tags for your post. Please also respond to and comment on three other posts per module before class. Feel free to use graphics, data, videos and links to other sites to corroborate your points.

Submitted (84)

Splitwise: Go Social and Use Data Fairly
Laura Barnes
Posted on March 26, 2018 at 5:58 pm
Splitwise should go social and use their data to enhance the experience.
reCAPTCHA: The Brilliant Business Model that Only One Man Could Create
Anton
Posted on March 26, 2018 at 4:45 pm
reCAPTCHA's founder used hidden crowdsourcing to solve two problems at once. But few have replicated his model.
Amazon takes on Hollywood
Y.Z.
Last modified on March 26, 2018 at 3:58 pm
A Big Tech company reinvests the old American classic by harnessing the power of the crowd.
LEGO Ideas – Attracting creative builders
TPA
Posted on March 26, 2018 at 3:18 pm
Outsourcing product ideation
Accenture – Professional Services Giant Leveraging the Crowd?
RobD
Last modified on March 26, 2018 at 6:01 pm
With $100M market cap, >$35 billion in revenues, and 425,000 employees, Accenture is arguably the largest professional services firm in the world. With no products, Accenture’s greatest asset is its people… they sell human capital. Therefore, decisions about how to [...]
Building Together: How LEGO leverages crowdsourcing to sustain both innovation and brand love
PD
Last modified on March 26, 2018 at 5:48 pm
LEGO has created an online community of nearly one million members and is using crowdsourcing both to select new product ideas and provide their most loyal supporters an outlet to share their creations.
DonorsChoose.org: building a platform to crowdfund classrooms
m_watson
Last modified on March 25, 2018 at 8:20 am
DonorsChoose.org is a non-profit crowdfunding website connecting individual donors and teachers / classrooms in need. They successfully built a platform where 75% of gifts are from donors who don’t share ties to those making the request by building trust, transparency, [...]
Apple ResearchKit – Crowdsourcing Medical Research
u.know.it
Last modified on March 26, 2018 at 5:40 pm
Apple ResearchKit - Crowdsourcing Medical Research. Is it a good idea by Apple? Why is Apple well positioned to deliver such a framework? Has it been successful?
The Largest Secret Santa Exchange in the World
NT
Posted on March 26, 2018 at 3:59 pm
RedditGifts lets you exchange gifts with strangers on the internet, and it's less creepy than it sounds.
RealtyMogul – Is Crowdfunding Real Estate Investment Worth It?
CW
Posted on March 26, 2018 at 3:33 pm
RealtyMogul is a real estate crowdfunding platform where investors, real estate investment sponsors, and borrowers come together to create mutually agreeable real estate investments.
Crowdsourcing for Cash – Cryptocurrency Mining
ADW
Posted on March 26, 2018 at 4:50 pm
Bitcoin has taken advantage of distributed computing. What other resources are underutilized and ripe for crowdsourcing?
Mapillary: mapping the world with crowd sourced photographs
MMidd
Posted on March 24, 2018 at 2:08 pm
Mapillary is leveraging crowds to collect street level images and stitching them together into an enormous 3-D map to help make the world more accessible to everyone.
ReCaptchuring Value
L
Posted on March 26, 2018 at 6:00 pm
Very annoying; very useful.
Brainly – Leveraging the wisdom of the crowds to do your homework
Rachel
Last modified on November 22, 2019 at 2:27 pm
Imagine you’re struggling with your calculus homework. If you really needed help you might have called your friend from class. But students today have a new option. Today, more than 100 million students are logging into Brainly to use the [...]
Zooniverse: Anyone Can be a Researcher
JC
Posted on March 25, 2018 at 11:09 pm
Zooniverse if a platform that allows anyone to become a researcher by posting research projects for volunteers to partake in as well as allowing volunteers to post their own projects to gain help on.
TripAdvisor: From small B2B business above a pizza shop to the top travel site
Pumchanut
Last modified on March 26, 2018 at 5:23 pm
TripAdvisor was founded in February 2000 in Massachusetts by Stephen Kaufer, the current president and CEO and Langley Steinert. The company was originally meant to be an online compilation travel tips from magazines and guidebooks with a simple button for [...]
Building Solutions on TopCoder
Walter
Posted on March 26, 2018 at 4:40 pm
Leveraging the crowd, competition, and a marketplace platform to develop solutions through TopCoder.
OpenIDEO: Can the power of crowds solve our toughest social problems?
kt
Posted on March 26, 2018 at 4:34 pm
Tapping into the design thinking methodology that was pioneered by its parent company, IDEO, OpenIDEO puts this powerful tool and methodology in the hands of many in an attempt to ignite even more innovation among some of the world’s most [...]
Bottoms up! Casemates.com offers a new community-driven wine marketplace
A
Posted on March 26, 2018 at 5:36 pm
The new online venture, recently launched through a Kickstarter campain, aims to build a community of wine lovers and consumers interested in buying cases of wine together, directly from US producers.
Patreon: Modernizing and crowdsourcing patronage of the arts
Jay Kumar
Last modified on March 26, 2018 at 7:06 am
Patreon allows creators of all stripes to crowdsource funding on a subscription basis.
The Origin of Netflix’s Success
Gloria
Posted on March 26, 2018 at 4:35 pm
How did Netflix develop its initial strategies, and how the early on lessons set the tone for its long-term growth?
Folding@Home: Crowdsourcing a cure for cancer?
Pasha
Last modified on March 26, 2018 at 5:53 pm
When we think about crowdsourcing initiatives, we often think about for-profit ventures like Threadless or Kickstarter. But what if you could use crowdsourcing to solve some of humanity’s greatest challenges, and even save millions of lives? Well that’s exactly what [...]
Quantopian: the democratization of Wall Street?
SAG
Posted on March 26, 2018 at 10:55 am
As quant hedge funds approach the $1 trillion AUM mark can crowd-sourcing investment algorithms proof to be a sustainable strategy to get an edge over the competition?
Premise: Using Crowdsourcing to Connect Governments with Markets and Citizens
PH
Posted on March 26, 2018 at 5:15 pm
Premise's network of 80,000 contributors across 30 countries gather local data to provide fast insights into local economics and more. Can the company grow its work with government?
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