/tacanderson

Saw this thought process a lot in high school too. The "individualists" who all looked the same - emo, apathetic, angst, and all hating the world in unison. It always made me chuckle to think they believed they were unique when in reality they were all the same.

IMHO being unique and an individual doesn't mean marching to the beat of that different drummer that everyone else hears, it means hearing your own music and dancing do it, regardless of what others think. It could mean being the preppy kid at a grunge-fest. It could mean being the conservative in the Pacific NW (smile). It could mean being the man who actually wants to get married and have kids, or the woman who would rather pursue a career than a family. Or it could be the woman who wants to put her all into raising her family even though some chastise that choice because they think she "has more to offer". These are the people who will all have their voice heard in a crowdsourcing situation. They are all individuals. And it's what makes this place so interesting to begin with!

I think you could apply Pareto's principle of 80/20 here. Sure, not everyone is going to participate in crowd sourcing, and I think it's a good assumption that 80% of the contribution will come from 20% of the participants. But that's still darned good, statistically speaking.

I love crowdsourcing. I don't get tons of participation every time, but what I do always get are unique perspectives, which is what I was after in the first place :) I don't think it's a myth at all, and I certainly don't think it kills incentive of the inventor, because it allows them to take pieces of feedback from many places to craft and perfect ideas. And the pursuit of excellence is what all good thought leaders are after to begin with, whether the ideas from from within or from outside input.