Influx

Henry Jenkins latest post includes the following comment.

“At the heart of the Web 2.0 movement is this idea that there is real value created by tapping the shared wisdom of grassroots communities, composed mostly of fans, hobbyists, and other amateur media makers. I have often celebrated these efforts as helping to pave the way for a more participatory culture — one that will be more diverse and innovative because it expands the range of content we can access. Yet, as I suggested here a few weeks ago, there is a nagging question — if these grassroots efforts are generating value (and in fact, wealth) and their creative power is being tapped by major corporations, at what point should they start receiving a share of revenue for their work.”

There’s a finite group of users out there doing the heavy lifting on community/user generated sites ranging from You Tube to Digg. These people do it for the love of it and for the social recognition it might bring. People are entering ad-making contests because there’s an opportunity to get noticed and there are often some reasonable financial rewards.

However, as Henry Jenkins suggests some people are getting rich or richer of the back of this work and when does the backlash start to begin and how do you stop it.

Google’s $1.6 billion purchase had a lot of You Tube users and contributors talking and it wasn’t all complimentary.

So?..

Do the big user communities start sharing some of their ad revenue with their most important participants?

Do early stage start-ups raise money or offer stock from the first users and then reward their loyalty if they get sold?

Do companies that encourage their consumers to contribute ideas for products have to offer some back-end royalty deal if the ideas come to market?

Follow the trends and it looks like a user-generated/participatory culture model is coming to every category.

For many brands and organizations there’s going to be a strong temptation to abuse the trend to reap their own benefits.

As Influx has suggested for the past couple of years, there’s a bigger opportunity at stake; the chance to get down from that ivory tower and get closer to the consumer, but to do that properly and with respect requires treating those consumers who are prepared to contribute the most, as partners in the process.

Failure to do this will lead to revolt, rebellion and brand backlash, don’t say we didn’t warn you.