Increasing user-generated content

This page is being edited by Rosalie Kuyvenhoven EMBA09. In case of any questions/remarks contact me.

Description:

User-generated content refers to media content produced or primarily influenced by professional or non-professional end-users. As opposed to the traditional way of producing content, where traditional media producers, licensed broadcasters, and production companies create media content. User generated content reflects the expansion of media production through new technologies that are accessible and affordable to the general public. These include digital video, blogging, podcasting, mobile phone photography and wikis. In addition to these technologies, user-generated content may also employ a combination of open source, free software, and flexible licensing or related agreements to further diminish the barriers to collaboration, skill-building and discovery.

User generated content is not exclusively related to the internet. Traditional media, like television, newspapers and radio also use forms of user generated content. The development of online user generated content enables more and more people to publish their ideas in an easy and quick way. The development of user generated content can directly be linked to the evolution of ‘Web 2.0’. Although the definition is debated, a common element in all discussion around Web 2.0 is the use the web as a platform for online collaboration (see: [1]).

A recent evolution of user generated content is crowd sourcing. In crowd sourcing, organizations or individuals ask others participate in research, reviews, brainstorming or consulting. In crowd sourcing, the public is actively involved in the organization’s processes. It assumes that the ideas, opinions and work of the community add value to organizations.

More information at wikipedia [2]

Enablers:

• Increasing use of internet [3]

• Increasing use of digital media on internet [4]

• Increasing number of people going online [5]

• Increasing need of people for communication and information [6]

• Increasing use and importance of Virtual Communities [7]

• Increasing Power of Information [8]

• Growing availability of broadband services

• Growing availability of internet connected devices (PDAs, Smartphones, laptops)

• Development of internet technologies

• Wealth increase

• Democratization of public opinion / knowledge

Inhibitors:

1. Increasing copyright issues

Paradigms:

1. Opinion is not longer a monopoly of the traditional mass-media outlets (newspapers, magazines, news channels, etc) but it is seriously quetioned by independent journalists

2. The content available on internet is not longer unmodifiable. Users can create, modify, share and comment on the content of internet pages. The net is becoming a display window to promote your own creations

3. Internet is not longer a spce for getting information but a space to share experiences and opinions

Timing:

1983: Introduction of digital video

1988: The first digital camera is developed

1989: The Internet is opened to commercial use

1990: The world Wide Web (WWW) is created

1994: The first blog is created

2001: Wikipedia is launched

2001: Implementation of podcast

2003: My space is founded

2005: YouTube is founded

2005: BBC uses user-generated content to cover london bombings

Web Resources:

1. MySpace Homepage [9]

2. YouTube website[10]

3. Online Journalism Review [11]

4. Packaged Goods Media vs. Conversational Media: a comparison of UGC and professional/corporate media[12]

5. Wikipedia: an user-generated encyclopedia [13]