Free R&D as a cultural movement.

I recently wrote a post regarding Twitter’s use of independent developers as free R&D.  The point was driven home even more strongly during Apple’s WWDC, where many features implemented in iOS 5 were nearly identical to applications or services that already existed - in effect, both cases the company shipped a powerful but unfinished product, and asked third parties, and the user community, to tell them how to fix it.

And then, once value had been mined from the collaboration, it ceased to be a collaboration.

I’ve realized this isn’t just a phenomenon for large companies. Specifically given my experience in social media, the research and thinking time is often offloaded onto the individual, outside of work. The key similarity here is that a space and potential market is found, but those in positions of power are unsure how to create value and profit from that space.

And as a result, you get an industry filled with people like me, for whom digital communications is as much hobby and/or lifestyle as it is profession.

This has me wondering though, is the endgame the same?

Will there be a point where the agencies, consultancies, and corporations feel they’ve learned enough about mining value from online comms and culture that there is no longer that collaboration to explore and define the space?

I’d like to say no. But at the same time, I recognize that there isn’t an answer that would change my behaviour. This is the problem I’m interested in solving right now. How the role of people like me will shift after the problem is solved, is something to tackle in the future.

Print Deathwatch: Closing the design gap.

Using the Reeder for iPad application this morning (it’s brilliant) I started thinking about the value and profit chain surrounding the free content I read from blogs. The short version is, Reeder filled the final gap in that chain, and combined with the iPad, upgraded the content consumption experience with reference to blogging.

Let me expand on that.

A blogger writes to gain a voice, gain an audience, create a store of ideas, or to establish credibility or expertise. Some of these pursuits are motivated by personal needs, but others directly feed to business or monetary needs. “Establishing credibility or expertise” has an unmistakable ROI - and if you told coworkers you were spending an hour a day doing that, no one would question you. At this top level, the value (monetary and otherwise) should be clear.

Direct income from blogging usually comes down to advertising or sponsored content. The options range from Google AdWords, or networks like Federated Media (who I am quite intrigued by), to full on branded content, where posts are created in the “publication voice” to draw attention to an upcoming product. This isn’t “save the content industry” money, but it’s another economy within the chain, supporting the urge and inclination to create free content.

What I’m interested in this morning is the monetization of the design gap, between content published and aggregated online, and a fully designed print publication. I was floored by the beauty and interface of the Wired ipad application, because it felt like a digital magazine. I’m having the same reaction to the Reeder application, which interests me - this is a design solution for my personal collection of RSS feeds, a curated list of blogs which represent my interests. Constantly updating, and now designed in a consistent and fluid manner.

What I’m saying is: Reeder for iPad is the first piece of software that made my blog / RSS reading seem a direct competitor for my magazine reading.

A paid piece of software, adding another micro economy to the blogging process. And it has me thinking that maybe the “print is dead” crowd has a point. Maybe the era of the content creation leading directly to the pay cheque is over. As glossed over above, direct pay for content creation is probably going to be supplemental in a lot of cases. The money comes from leveraging what you and others have created, whether it be reputation you’ve built via your writing, filling the design gap, or creating the best device to consume that content from.

We’ve watched the music industry collapse due to the same disconnect - creating content does not flow directly into making money. Selling words is like selling music, it’s based on a fundamental failure to understand what digital means.

Put another way: I’m reading free content through a $5 application that runs on my tablet. And it’s hitting a point where the advantage in targeting, plus the closing gap in experience, is trumping the thin lead in quality that some print outlets still have.

A Hypothetical Query.

Upon (hypothetically) unlocking and jailbreaking my primary communications device, I asked a single question:

“I know a lot of developers - can I still buy apps from the store in the normal way?”

Meaning:

I will happily pay for applications (and prefer to do so if I have some connection to those developing the applications).

I consider paying for mobile software normal (moreso than I ever have for desktop / laptop software).

My (hypothetical) desire to jailbreak my primary communications device has little to do with a desire to get applications for free (therefore it must serve a need or a curiosity that can’t be served through ‘normal’ use of the device).

[The last question someone asks before doing something notable or disruptive is normally a source of at least this much information.]