User Innovation

Our last post initiated a discussion on Open Innovation and some of its advantages and disadvantages. In this post we are going to talk about another concept called User Innovation (UI).

A few days ago, I read in Consultoría Artesana this post about Radiohead and the recent release of the video of House of Cards on an open format, which means anyone interested could generate her own version. This reminded me that NIN did something similar when opened a remix web site to let his fans to make their own creations of NIN songs in November 27 of 2007. 

So you may wonder how all this connects to UI. To illustrate my point, take an artist as an example, one possible production system could consist of a creator (or a group) isolated working, trying to come up with some original piece of work, something revolutionary because that’s one of the the main characteristics the artist himself and the great public are looking for when they appreciate art. Now say for instance, that the artist prepares an exihbition were he displays an initial idea of a work and lets the audience to customize the piece according to their own tastes. This could be understood as a UI practice.

In more detail, UI could be defined as those improvements originated in end users. The concept it’s simple, in some cases, consumers are those who have better information about the product (innovation-related knowledge), its limitations and what’s more important, they know better than anyone their own needs. This is why users could be a very important source of innovation. Moreover, their incentives to innovate are related to own use as a way of improving their routines at works or when they practice their hobbies. The latter, is one feature of UI that leads to the free revealing of information, because when an end-user develops an innovation she doesn’t have in mind the appropriation of benefits it could yield, but the positive impact that could mean in her daily lives. This way, end-users give their ideas to manufacturers so they could crystallize them into a new or refined product that will satisfy better their needs as consumers. 

Many examples can be found in <the most obvious> Open Source, medical surgery equipment, extreme sporting equipment and as we elucidated before in the music industry. 

Henkel and Von Hippel work on this idea, which can be summarize as follows:

1. Users identify one particular need not cover by commercial sellers until the moment. They develop their own innovations as a complement to manufacturers products.
2. Information asymmetries between firms and users are reduced.
3. Free releasing of the innovation.

In short, UI could be defined as the interaction of users, those more interested in having a product fulfilling all their expectations and needs, with the manufacturers those with the means to produce it to large scale.

Coming back to Radiohead and NIN, we could conclude that this kind of initiatives are always welcome by their fans, always willing to contribute… is just necessary to see the great success those initiatives had.