This story – which could only have happened now, confronts a pile of 20th century assumptions about how things can be made to happen. The context is a new gizmo…but it could equally be a solution to a social problem, made possible by the explosion of crowd-sourcing and networking platforms. It shows how, in the 21st Century, the only capital you really need is intellectual capital.
http://www.therussiansusedapencil.com/post/2794775825/idea-to-market-in-5-months-making-the-glif
This story introduced me to Kickstarter, www.kickstarter.com. Now anyone with a lazy $5 can be a venturer capitalist contributing to great innovations.
Meanwhile, Kiva, www.kiva.org, transforms ordinary folks into micro-financiers of projects in the developing world.
I reckon an equivalent funding platform for local social innovation initiatives must be just around the corner.
The the design and innovation field, there’s no lack of choice for crowd-sourcing platforms:
- RedesignMe – community co-creation
- Atizo – open innovation market place
- Innovation Exchange – open innovation market place
- ideaken – collaborative crowdsourcing
- Idea Bounty – crowdsourcing ideas
- Guerra Creativa – crowdsourcing anything from logos to websites
- Brand Tags – tagging brands
- Battle of concepts – student challenges
- Brainrack – student challenges
- crowdSPRING – creative designs
- BootB.com – custom creative ideas for any creative need
- Myoo Create – environmental and social challenges
- 12designer – marketplace for creative solutions
- LeadVine – crowdsourcing lead generation
- 99designs – pioneer in design crowdsourcing
- Edge Amsterdam – elite sourcing platform
- OpenIDEO – collaborative design platform
- Challenge.gov – crowdsourced solutions for government problems
[List from – http://www.openinnovators.net/list-open-innovation-crowdsourcing-examples]