Weird Turn Pro
Crowdsourcing for Creatives
South by Southwest Interactive, 8 March 2008
Derek Powazek
CEO Pixish
www.pixish.com

“When the going gets weird,
the weird turn pro.”
– Hunter S. Thompson

Three Lies
1. Everyone on the net is an idiot.
2. Good stuff is too hard to find.
3. You can’t make any money.

Lie 1: Everyone on the net is an idiot

Kim Pedersen’s Backyard Monorail

Wikipedia

Lie 2: Good stuff is too hard to find.

Human
Traditional Editors
Nontraditional Editors
Moderators
Finding the Good Stuff

Human Computer
Traditional Editors Text Search
Nontraditional Editors Google’s PageRank
Moderators Technorati
Finding the Good Stuff

Human Hybrid Computer
Traditional Editors Flickr Interestingness Text Search
Nontraditional Editors Community Vote Google’s PageRank
Moderators Best of Both
Finding the Good Stuff

Flickr’s Interestingness

Flickr’s Interestingness

Wisdom of Crowds

Design for Selfishness

Learning from Assignment Zero

“Using crowdsourcing as a cost-saving
measure doesn’t work.
Communities must be cultivated,
respected, and managed if they are
to create economic value.”
– Jeff Howe, who coined the term “crowdsourcing”

Lie 3: You can’t make any money.

Threadless

Threadless

A Threadless Story

A Threadless Story

Hooray for happy endings!

Pixish

Cautionary Tales

Yahoo Games Wii Site

Yahoo Games Wii Site

GM Tahoe Apprentice Campaign

Community is Grown, Not Built

How to Grow Community
1. Give people tools they want.
2. Trust them to do good.
3. Reward good contributions.
4. Punish bad contributions.
5. Expect the unexpected.

Ever Forward
www.powazek.com