Absorbing knowledge from creative youth

ABSORBING KNOWLEDGE FROM CREATIVE YOUTH

Based on the following paper and other work in progress.

Berthon, P.R., Pitt, L.F., McCarthy, I.P., and Kates, S.M. 2007. When Customers Get Clever: Managerial Approaches to Dealing with Creative Consumers. Business Horizons, 50(1): 39-47.

(Download a PDF of the paper)

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ian_mccarthy@sfu.ca

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SOME ASSUMPTIONS• Entrepreneurship: identifying high-potential opportunities (business,

social, etc.) and exploiting these opportunities.

• Innovation: processing of producing and exploiting new things

• Research: the transformation of resources (time & $$$) into knowledge.

• Commercialization: the transformation of knowledge into money/impacts

• User innovation: innovation that is undertaken by end users, both firms and consumers who at the time were users of the product or service that they innovated innovation.

GEORGE HOTZ (GEOHOT): THE JAIL BREAKER

• An alumnus of the Johns Hopkins Center for Talented Youth program.

• At 19 yrs. old hacks iPhones (Feb 2008)

• In Nov 2009 hacks Playstation 3.

• Apple does nothing

• Sony launches law suit

• Facebook employs him

NEWMAN DARBY AND LARRY STANLEY: THE LEAD USERS

• In 1948, Darby aged 20 develops the first windsurfing board

• In the 1970s Stanley and his teenage friends helped develop many of the innovations in high performance windsurfing.

• Founded the firm Windsurfing Hawaii.

• Windsurfing is now a multibillion dollar industry

JOSE AVILA: THE USER DESIGNER

JOSE AVILA: THE USER DESIGNER

JOSE AVILA: THE USER DESIGNER• He posted his furniture on a web site.• FedEx promptly overnighted a cease and desist letter.• Lawyers at the Stanford Law School Center for Internet and

Society represented him for free.

• consumer comments on weblogs persist: – “This really brightened my day! The letters are classic lawyer

exchange. My husband and I laughed and laughed. Lawyers jousting at windmills...”,

– “FedEx needs to lighten up. Jose is a bright and innovative young man, and instead of making his life miserable, they should give him a great job.

JEFF MOSS (THE DARK TANGENT): THE BLACK HAT

• At high school he was a “phreaker”

• During the 1980s as a teenager he ran an underground bulletin board systems for hackers.

• In 1993 founded DEF CON, now the oldest and largest hacker conference in the world.

• In 2009 became a consultant for the U.S. Homeland Security Advisory Council

• In 2011 became chief security officer of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN)

NICK HAYLEY: CONSUMER GENERATED ADS

• In 2007 the 18 yr. old U.K. student created an ad for the iTouch and posted it into on YouTube.

• “We represent Apple and we’ve seen what you have produced and we’d like a chat with you”

• Click on the picture to watch his advert.

THESE ARE ALL EXAMPLES OF CREATIVE CONSUMERS:

Creative consumers are any “individual or group, who adapts, modifies or transforms a proprietary product, service or idea” (Berthon, Pitt, McCarthy & Kates, 2007, page 40)

Based on the following paper:

Berthon, P.R., Pitt, L.F., McCarthy, I.P., and Kates, S.M. 2007. When Customers Get Clever: Managerial Approaches to Dealing with Creative Consumers. Business Horizons, 50(1): 39-47.

(Download a PDF of the paper)

WHAT DO THESE STORIES TELL US?

• Motivations (intrinsic vs. extrinsic)

• Products and services, both low tech and high tech are being innovated

• The faithfulness of the innovation varies

• There are varying levels of value in the innovations

• Individuals versus groups

• The reactions of firms, governments and societies can vary significantly

• These factors impact how we view, treat and absorb knowledge from creative consumers.

WHAT STANCE DO WE TAKE TOWARDS THESE CONSUMERS?

13

Firms attitude to consumer innovation

Firms action to consumer innovation

Passive

-ve

Active

+ve

RESISTActively restrain the innovation

ENCOURAGEHappy to allow but don’t help the innovation

DISCOURAGEDefacto ignore or tolerate the innovation

ENABLEActively facilitate the innovation

THE “WHY” AND “WHAT”

14

ConsumerMotivation

Unfaithful

Intrinsic

Faithful

Extrinsic

PATRIOTSCreative consumers who are loyal to the product’s original functionality and innovate for the experience itself.

MAVERICKSCreative consumers who are initially motivated by external rewards to alter a product’s functionality.

REBELSCreative consumer who are disloyal to the product’s original functionality and innovate for the experience itself.

MERCENARIESCreative consumers who are initially motivated by external rewards to loyally enhance product offerings.

Appropriate

Berthon, P.R., Pitt, L.F., McCarthy, I.P., and Kates, S.M. 2007. When Customers Get Clever: Managerial Approaches to Dealing with Creative Consumers. Business Horizons, 50(1): 39-47

IMPLICATIONS FOR GOVERNMENTS, SCHOOLS AND UNIVERSITIES

• How do we teach youth to jailbreak, hack, phreak, modify and re-appropriate products?

• Could/should we apply/adapt the stances for schools and universities?

• What are the intrinsic and extrinsic factors that drive “youth” to innovate?

• What facilitating mechanisms should schools and universities employ?

• What barriers that prevent youth from being creative consumers

DRIVERS, FACILITATORS AND BARRIERS

Drivers Facilitators BarriersFunInterest and curiosityCommercialProblem solvingDissatisfactionSelf-expressionPeer recognitionBoredomRevenge

Tool kitsSpaces and placesHeroes,Mentors,Resources (time, $, knowledge)ContextProtectionChannels

AdultsRules, laws and regulationsConfidenceLack of resources

THANK YOU