Micah Baldwin › Comments

"The "mass collaboration" (a component of the definition) comes from the voting side, not the submission side. Well, thats not entirely true. They have a critique section, where people can submit designs and get feedback from the community prior to submitting them for voting. With threadless, the jury is the community. They select, via vote, the top designs, of which some are selected to print. Its in their best interest, that the shirts sell, so that it validates the entire process. It is, in the strictest sense of the definition, crowdsourcing. Does it have competitive components? Sure. Is it a strict competition? No. Is Wikipedia? Sure. A person can make changes, and the hope is that another member of the community will correct mistakes. The community as a whole, will ensure that the information is correct because its in their best interest that the information contained in the Wikipedia." - Micah Baldwin

"The way threadless works is that designs are voted on, then a collection of the highest scoring designs are reviewed for selection. There is no winner, per se. The crowd helps select, they are not the final selection." - Micah Baldwin

"Thats not crowdsourcing, thats a contest. Again, crowdsourcing is solving a problem by asking the crowd to come up with a solution or a number of solutions for no reward. Thats the major issue. People are calling things crowdsourcing that are not crowdsourcing." - Micah Baldwin

"Brandon is one smart dude. I like much of his writing. Remember crowdsourcing is about problem solving. Community management is about fostering the community so that when you need to turn to them to help solve a problem, they will be ready and willing to help. Thats the trick. Creating an environment where your community is passionate and where a open line of communication exists is paramount to successfully utilizing crowdsourcing as problem solving tool. Passion isnt inherent nor can it spontaneously appear. It comes from exactly what you wrote: a sense of belonging, and understanding that each person has a real effect on the future of the business. Its non-competitive. Its open communication." - Micah Baldwin

"I think that you are missing the point...slightly. The idea is that if the crowd is large enough, and they are focused on improving the product and/or company, then the "wisdom" is derived from that size. Its not about the "right" decision; its about the "right" decision for the community. With Threadless, its about what designs would the community buy if they were on a tshirt. With TomTom its about the accuracy of their maps and the additional information (POI) than enhance those maps. The key to crowdsourcing is that its the community improving the community. I would argue that Digg lost its community a long time ago. That it became less about improving the community and more about individual gain. That the community at large was no longer a cohesive unit focused on the improvement of Digg as a whole. Wisdom, is often in the eye of the beholder, and if a company allows their community to drive their direction they may make conventional unwise decisions, but market smart ones." - Micah Baldwin

"The definition of crowdsourcing is using "a crowd" (usually unpaid) to solve a problem. In TomTom's case its keeping its maps up to date. Its a classic usage of crowdsourcing. Your perception is where crowdsourcing has gotten off the rails. The idea is that if you take a bunch of folks and throw them at a problem, the outcome will correct for the outliers and the folks trying to game/break the system. But, at its basis, its allowing a group of people (usually a large group of people) help solve a problem. Take Threadless, usually used as the poster child for crowdsourcing. They are using a group of people to come up with the "best" tshirt designs (read most sellable). Then Threadless selects from the group of "best" tshirt designs and prints those. This is much different than CrowdSpring, which is not traditional crowdsourcing, but rather a contest. With Crowdspring, the "crowd" competes against itself to come up with a single design selected by the crowdspring user. In the..." - Micah Baldwin

via tweetie ... - Micah Baldwin

See more in my Dopplr profile. - Micah Baldwin

I'll be there from November 3rd until November 5th. See more in my Dopplr profile. - Micah Baldwin

See more in my Dopplr profile. - Micah Baldwin

"I bet they did. Here is a website I did for her like 8 years ago: http://www.renakrasno.com/" - Micah Baldwin

So is this you tweeting about oversharing? ;-) - Jesse Stay

I'm in 4 or 5 - need more in my arsenal. I should do another road trip. - Jesse Stay

I'll be there from October 28th until October 30th. See more in my Dopplr profile. - Micah Baldwin

"In the case of a lifestyle business, sure, that exit makes sense, but I was thinking more around venture backed companies. In most cases, there is a push for either M or IPO. Generally, the concept is that there is an “exit” on the decision. The decision is over, and its time to move on to the next one." - Micah Baldwin

"That is an amazing quote. I might have to get that tattoo’d somewhere..." - Micah Baldwin

"You were nervous to meet me? See, that always bums me out. Im not that scary... :) Thanks for the kind words. I do think that people can be spurred to action by others, but I dont people “inspire” people. Most people are already leaning in a particular direction, and just need a nudge. It is clear that you nudge better than most. Me? Im kinda a shover." - Micah Baldwin

"That is an amazing quote. I might have to get that tattoo’d somewhere..." - Micah Baldwin

"You were nervous to meet me? See, that always bums me out. Im not that scary... :) Thanks for the kind words. I do think that people can be spurred to action by others, but I dont people “inspire” people. Most people are already leaning in a particular direction, and just need a nudge. It is clear that you nudge better than most. Me? Im kinda a shover." - Micah Baldwin

"Personally, I like to not care about the trees and just barrel through the course. Small things like trees are too much worry for me! :)" - Micah Baldwin

See more in my Dopplr profile. - Micah Baldwin

"The concept of compelling vs. inspiration is very interesting. Thanks for bringing it up, I will have to think on it... Can people be compelled to do something based on others actions? Probably..." - Micah Baldwin

"is it just me, or is 5 years from 2009, 2014, not 2013? What? Im just saying that the math isnt so strong in the Cheezburger world..." - Micah Baldwin

Asypta - Louis Gray

what does it mean? - Micah Baldwin from email

See more in my Dopplr profile. - Micah Baldwin

"all my slides are on http://slideshare.net/micahb. Its Wibiya.com for the toolbar." - Micah Baldwin

"I just spoke in front of my sister's high school classes this am, and discussed failure. These are kids that will be the first in their families to go to college (if they can make it through high school). In many ways, they are "startups": have a clear goal in mind, a general idea of how to get there, and a internal motivation to get there. For many of them, and many startups to only way to achieve their goals is to take a major left turn at Albuquerque. The question is always if they have the strength to do it. Eric, your strength is one that I have never questioned. Tough decisions; hard choices. Difficult for everyone to deal with. But, the right thing is the right thing. Good luck, and let me know what I can do to help. For you, the folks affected by this layoff, and your team." - Micah Baldwin

"I would give this post between a 7 and a 9. :) Most people use ranges to indicate flexibility, when in fact they are indicating indecisiveness. Its like shaking your head no, and saying yes. It confuses and tends to lead to extended discussions rather than shorten them. I prefer to say "I want/need X. If you dont feel that is fair, I am open to having discussion so that we are both happy with the outcome." Sets a proper expectation and entry point for the discussion." - Micah Baldwin

I'll be there from September 23rd until October 1st. See more in my Dopplr profile. - Micah Baldwin

"John, Ill be around. The great thing is that you will be able to meet some of the other great Lijit team members like Tara and Greg. Im sure they will be as visible as I was!" - Micah Baldwin

"Good luck with the 140 conference! I look forward to hearing about how well it went!" - Micah Baldwin