Peer Pioneers:
This chapter delves into peer pioneers and gives more examples.
One point that is made is that in favor of these open source communities is that the contributors are individuals, not employees of a specific company. I think this argument goes both ways though. While it is a lot cheaper for companies to use open source than pay their employees to create something, there is no guarantee that they are going to get the exact product that they need. There is problem with incentives may be unaligned. The communities are not profit driven while companies are. When a company embraces this new way of doing things, it gives up control which is unsettling to many managers. Also, as IBM learned, employees have to learn to play by the ‘community’ rules where a sort of organic hierarchy emerges.
On the other side, the great thing about open source is that through constantly improving, it eases the implementation and testing part challenges of introducing new software. Bugs are eradicated almost immediately.
An interesting discord exists between the commons and private sector. (socialism v. capitalism??) I think that open source is a new sort of commons. Generally, it is a small number of people working for the good of all of society. It is interesting to me because the problems with commons typically are that of social loafing, free riders, etc. I’m not sure if the problem is magnified here or if it can be avoided by redefining who is included in the ‘commons.’ Perhaps this is merely more evidence of the technology revolution. Do we have to decide between what’s best for the commons (or society in general) or keeping or economy going (by promoting capitalism)? Are we making ourselves obsolete by allowing open source to find solutions for everyone? Or are the old encyclopedia salesman going to be able to find a new job since wikipedia has put them out of business? The authors seem to think that it is possible in the pharmaceutical industry to increase the overall welfare of society while still keeping it competitive.
After this chapter, I understand more of the benefits and advantage to open sourcing and “peer” productions. Applying this to the business context, for me it underlines how important it is to be flexible and to constantly keep getting better. Because the moment you become complacent because you think you’re ahead with your amazing product, the competition is going to be coming up with something better. And everyone is a competitor. If any end user sees a way to improve upon your product or make something better, it is now possible for them to compete on a large scale. (ex: the guy who started UnderArmour, Google, Etc.)
4 comments:
Many people are not profit driven either. I know alot of people who took a pay cut to do something they enjoy. Also, many HR studies show that employees are often more motivated by ego, rather than money. Reward an employee with public praise rather than a bonus is the new consensus.
Another problem is the tragedy of the commons. When no none owns something, they will abuse it and ruin it.
I think the key to the old encyclopedia companies is to make a product so superior that people will be willing to pay for it.
That's just it though-how are the old encyclopedia companies going to compete with a superior product? Hire the rest of the world to write articles? With millions of people working for their 15 minutes of fame (or 2 wikipedia articles), how is World Book or Brittanica going to compete? The old school Encyclopedia got their warning a long time ago. Remember when Encarta first came out ? I'm not sure who owns it, but to me that was one of the first signs that encyclopedias as books weren't going to last.
It is interesting that you mention free riders. Aren't the masups some sort of free riders... Same with open software? I didn't really think about that until I saw it in your blog.
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