Wiki Book
(Scott) Perhaps you've already seen this in the media... I just find it fascinating: http://www.wearesmarter.org/
In a nutshell, professors from MIT and Wharton are writing the first "networked book on business"... an exploration of the role of social networks in business. The book is being written by wiki; so, essentially the professors have written the chapter titles and they are relying on the public to write all the content via the wiki. A ghost writer will later edit all the content into a neat little (or likely big) book for sale to the public. None of the contributors (besides of course the professors who managed to write the chapter titles) will be compensated.
Would you contribute to something like this? Is it taking advantage of the public? Would you buy the book? Is it credible enough?
This answers some of the questions from Pam's previous post... it's sort of consolidating the "best of" content out there on a specific topic for easier digestion. What do you think?
In a nutshell, professors from MIT and Wharton are writing the first "networked book on business"... an exploration of the role of social networks in business. The book is being written by wiki; so, essentially the professors have written the chapter titles and they are relying on the public to write all the content via the wiki. A ghost writer will later edit all the content into a neat little (or likely big) book for sale to the public. None of the contributors (besides of course the professors who managed to write the chapter titles) will be compensated.
Would you contribute to something like this? Is it taking advantage of the public? Would you buy the book? Is it credible enough?
This answers some of the questions from Pam's previous post... it's sort of consolidating the "best of" content out there on a specific topic for easier digestion. What do you think?
posted by ROInnovation at 12:54 PM
5 Comments:
Looks really interesting and it seems that you do get acknowledged if you contribute:
Who will be listed as authors in the published product?
All contributors will be listed, in print, as authors*. You'll be able to take a copy of the book and show it to your friends, colleagues and family
This i think gives it a much greater chance of success. Also I would buy it as I think the philosophy behind it, group minds are better than individual could lead to some really interesting thinking.
so do you think we can contribute on the topic of innovation or creativity?
It's definitely great that you get recognized... but is it fair that you're not paid for your intellectual contributions / property? It seems a portion of the profits will be allocated to charity... but some will also go to the editors and community manager.
And Pam, there is a chapter titled "How can communities research?" that explores how communities explore new products and ideas. Could be an interesting start point.
To be honest I think if royalties where paid that they would be tiny amounts to an individual, given the potential number of contributors, the fact that this is an unproven approach and a business book, i don't believe that it will generate substantial enough revenues to make the administration of payments worthwhile.
Also I would say that it is fair that the publishers/ community leaders get a portion of profits as arguably they have more work to do.
In terms of contributing, I think it is probably more of an intellectual exercise, with the satisfaction that accompanies that will be driving people.
Also i think that the argument that all contributors should earn something could be taken for youtube/ myspace etc. Where arguably the individuals contributing have generated substantial sums for the people who set them up, now why don't they get something back? Is it because it's a free service? Perhaps the next iteration of these could be a co-op model....
Adam - you make a number of valid points. If the wiki book coordinators do in fact use the voices of many (as opposed to a few experts) to write the book, then payment would be small and administration cumbersome.
I like your idea of a co-op approach to site ownership. I wonder how co-op ownership would affect content quality. For example, YouTube was sold for $1.65B. If 1 million people have posted content, and each was entitled to their share of the sale price, each would receive $1,650 (USD). Better than a kick in the head for sure.
However, some of the videos have been viewed hundreds of thousands of times, while others... just hundreds. Should earnings be aportioned according to popularity, or should it operate as a true co-op? Is there an incentive for me to create a fantastic video if I know most of the value I'm creating is being spread across the larger community of contributors? Lots of food for thought... and a web business model that could be worth an experiment.
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