user innovation

In 1986 Eric von Hippel introduced the lead user method that can be used to systematically learn about user innovation in order to apply it in new product development. In 2007 another specific type of user innovator, the creative consumer was introduced. These are consumers who adapt, modify, or transform a proprietary offering as opposed to creating completely new products.

User innovation has a number of degrees: innovation of use,{{cite journal |last1=Faulkner |first1=Philip |last2=Runde |first2=Jochen |title=On the Identity of Technological Objects and User Innovations in Function |journal=Academy of Management Review |date=July 2009 |volume=34 |issue=3 |pages=442–462 |doi=10.5465/amr.2009.40632318 }} innovation in services, innovation in configuration of technologies, and finally the innovation of novel technologies themselves. While most user innovation is concentrated in use and configuration of existing products and technologies, and is a normal part of long term innovation, new technologies that are easier for end-users to change and innovate with, and new channels of communication are making it much easier for user innovation to occur and have an impact.

Recent research has focused on Web-based forums that facilitate user (or customer) innovation - referred to as virtual customer environment, these forums help companies partner with their customers in various phases of product development as well as in other value creation activities. For example, Threadless, a T-shirt manufacturing company, relies on the contribution of online community members in the design process. The community includes a group of volunteer designers who submit designs and vote on the designs of others. In addition to free exposure, designers are provided monetary incentives including a $2,500 base award as well as a percentage of T-shirt sales. These incentives allow Threadless to encourage continual user contribution.Magee,Joe. "[https://hbr.org/2008/10/the-contribution-revolution-letting-volunteers-build-your-business The Contribution Revolution: Letting Volunteers Build Your Business]", Harvard Business Review, October 2008.

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• Creativity techniques
• Crowdsourcing
• Domestication theory
• Ideas bank
• List of emerging technologies
• Open-design movement
• Participatory design
• Professional amateurs
• Prosumer
• Science and technology studies
• Toolkits for User Innovation

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{{reflist}}

• {{cite journal |last1=Bilgram |first1=Volker |last2=Brem |first2=Alexander |last3=Voigt |first3=Kai-Ingo |title=USER-CENTRIC INNOVATIONS IN NEW PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT — SYSTEMATIC IDENTIFICATION OF LEAD USERS HARNESSING INTERACTIVE AND COLLABORATIVE ONLINE-TOOLS |journal=International Journal of Innovation Management |date=September 2008 |volume=12 |issue=3 |pages=419–458 |doi=10.1142/S1363919608002096 }}
• {{cite journal |last1=Bogers |first1=Marcel |last2=Afuah |first2=Allan |last3=Bastian |first3=Bettina |title=Users as Innovators: A Review, Critique, and Future Research Directions |journal=Journal of Management |date=July 2010 |volume=36 |issue=4 |pages=857–875 |doi=10.1177/0149206309353944 }}
• Braun, Viktor R.G. (2007): Barriers to user-innovation & the paradigm of licensing to innovate, Doctoral dissertation: Hamburg University of Technology
• {{Citation | last = Fleck | first = James | title = Innofusion or Diffusation? The nature of technological development in robotics

| year =1988 | journal=Edinburgh PICT Working Paper No. 7 }}

• {{Citation | last = Nambisan | first = Satish| author2 = Nambisan, Priya | title = How to Profit from a better Virtual Customer Environment | url = http://sloanreview.mit.edu/the-magazine/articles/2008/spring/49313/how-to-profit-from-a-better-virtual-customer-environment/ | year =2008 | journal= MIT Sloan Management Review | pages= 53–61 }}
• {{Citation | last = Tuomi | first = Ilkka | author-link = Ilkka Tuomi

| year = 2002 | title = Networks of Innovation | url = http://www.oup.com/uk/catalogue/?ci=9780199256983 | publisher = Oxford University Press | isbn = 978-0-19-925698-3 }}

• {{Citation | last = von Hippel | first = Eric | title = Democratizing Innovation

| year =2005 | publisher= MIT Press | url = http://web.mit.edu/evhippel/www/books.htm}}

• {{cite journal |last1=von Hippel |first1=Eric |title=Lead Users: A Source of Novel Product Concepts |journal=Management Science |date=July 1986 |volume=32 |issue=7 |pages=791–805 |doi=10.1287/mnsc.32.7.791 }}
• {{cite journal |last1=Williams |first1=Robin |last2=Edge |first2=David |title=The social shaping of technology |journal=Research Policy |date=September 1996 |volume=25 |issue=6 |pages=865–899 |doi=10.1016/0048-7333(96)00885-2 }}
• {{cite journal |last1=Faulkner |first1=Philip |last2=Runde |first2=Jochen |title=On the Identity of Technological Objects and User Innovations in Function |journal=Academy of Management Review |date=July 2009 |volume=34 |issue=3 |pages=442–462 |doi=10.5465/amr.2009.40632318 }}

• [https://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/25/business/yourmoney/25Proto.html?_r=1&ref=yourmoney&oref=slogin New York Times on User Innovation (2007)]
• [http://dynamist.com/articles-speeches/nyt/innovation.html New York Times on User Innovation (2005)]
• [http://web.mit.edu/evhippel/www/books.htm Eric Von Hippel's books on user innovation], available under the creative commons license.
• [http://www.incrementalinnovation.com/innovation-management-development/culture-innovation Innovation Culture]
• [https://visionx.io/ VisionX]
• [http://usercontribution.intuit.com/ The Contribution Revolution wiki] collects information about user contribution systems in the business world. It is based on the [http://www.hbsp.harvard.edu/hbsp/hbr/articles/article.jsp?ml_action=get-article&articleID=R0810C&ml_issueid=BR0810&ml_subscriber=true&pageNumber=1&_requestid=300861 Harvard Business Review article of the same name] by Scott Cook

{{Science and technology studies}}

Category:Innovation

Category:User interfaces

Category:Science and technology studies