Examples

Our selection of real-life examples of network-based innovation.

BUSINESS-RELATED APPLICATIONS

Harley Owners Group
Harley-Davidson® established the Harley Owners Group® in 1983 in response to a growing desire by Harley® riders for an organized way to share their passion and show their pride. Today, nearly a million members make H.O.G. the largest factory-sponsored motorcycle organization in the world.

InnoCentive
InnoCentive is an online forum that allows scientists and science-based companies to collaborate in a global community to achieve innovative solutions to complex challenges. Companies including Boeing, Dow Chemical, Eli Lilly, P&G, and others, post scientific problems confidentially on the InnoCentive Web site where more than 85,000 scientists and scientific organizations in more than 175 countries can solve them and receive financial compensation.

NineSigma
NineSigma facilitates open innovation strategies for Fortune 500 companies seeking to acquire technical innovations developed outside their organization. NineSigma’s clients span a variety of industries including automotive, biomedical, chemical, consumer products, electronics, food, materials, pharmaceutical, and telecommunications among others. Through its proprietary Managed Exchange (M:XTM) process, NineSigma matches technology seekers with unobvious or disruptive innovations that enable companies to drive top-line growth.

Polycom User Group
The Polycom User Group (PUG) was founded in 2002 as an independent, global organization focused on providing an educational and peer networking vehicle in the Conferencing industry. PUG focuses on promoting and encouraging communication between users of Polycom Corporation products and services. The group provides feedback to Polycom on product enhancements and new developments, and works toward the overall education of the conferencing professional.

Prosper
Prosper, a people-to-people lending marketplace, was created to make consumer lending more financially and socially rewarding for everyone. The way Prosper works is intuitive to people who have used eBay. Instead of listing and bidding on items, however, people list and bid on loans using Prosper's online auction platform.

TaxAlmanac
TaxAlmanac is a free tax research resource spnosored by Intuit. Its goal is to transform tax research and to improve the effectiveness of tax professionals everywhere. TaxAlmanac draws on the power of community and wiki technology—content on TaxAlmanac is written by tax professionals from across the country and takes advantage of the knowledge of academia as well as practioners.

Tremor
Tremor is a marketing service – powered by The Procter & Gamble Company – that develops teen word-of-mouth marketing programs. Tremor is a marketing group that recruits teens to help develop exciting and relevant product ideas and marketing programs that teens want to talk about. Today, the Tremor Crew is made up of over a quarter of a million teens from across the U.S. Members help develop product ideas and marketing programs that teens want to talk about.

Zopa
Zopa is a UK-based company providing an online money exchange, allowing people who have money to lend to provide it directly to people wanting to borrow it, without the need to go through banks. The name, ZOPA, stands for Zone Of Possible Agreement, a negotiating term identifying the bounds within which agreement can be reached between two parties.

CONTENT GENERATORS & INFORMATION BROKERS

FutureMonitor™
FutureMonitor™ is a virtual community of thousands of diverse contributors around the world who carry on a conversation about what’s next in business, science, technology, and policy. Together, they continuously update the answer to the question, “What will business be focused on two years from now?”

H2O
The H2O project, founded by the Berkman Center for Internet & Society, is building an interlocking collection of communities based on the free creation and exchange of ideas. The founding premise of the H2O project is that the university world has something to add to the growth of the Internet that the commercial world cannot contribute.

Since Sliced Bread
Since Sliced Bread is creating a national conversation about policies that can potentially improve the day-to-day lives of working men and women and their families. Sponsored by the Service Employees International Union, the site encourages ordinary Americans, policy experts, and economists to enter ideas on how to create the kinds of jobs that allow people to raise families, obtain affordable health insurance, pay for college, and save for retirement. 

Omidyar.net
Omidyar.net is an online community – sponsored by the Omidyar Network, a mission-based investment group committed to fostering individual self-empowerment on a global scale – that allows members to share news and information; discuss different ideas and viewpoints; collaborate on documents; post announcements; sync up calendars; and, in general, stay well informed on issues related to positive social change around the world.

The WELL
The WELL is a gathering place dedicated to intelligent conversation. A unique and world-famous community of writers, technologists, artists, thinkers, and quirky experts exchanges information and opinions on a variety of topics. The subject matter ranges from anime to Web design, from legal issues to parenting, and to whatever WELL members decide to explore.

Wikipedia
Wikipedia is a multilingual Web-based free-content encyclopedia wiki service. Wikipedia is written collaboratively by volunteers, allowing most articles to be changed by anyone with access to a web browser. Wikipedia has more than 3,380,000 articles, and as of February 2006 it has more than 941,000 registered users.

Yahoo! Answers
Yahoo! Answers is a site where people ask each other questions on any topic, and get answers by sharing facts, opinions, and personal experiences. A rating system allows users to pick the best answers, and and the whole thread is archived and searchable.

SOCIAL NETWORKING

Friendster
Friendster is an online community for making new friends, communicating with existing friends, sharing information, organizing activities, finding dates, and reconnecting with lost friends.

LinkedIn
LinkedIn is an online network of more than 4.8 million experienced professionals from around the world, representing 130 industries. When you join, you create a profile that summarizes your professional accomplishments. Your profile helps you find and be found by former colleagues, clients, and partners.

LiveJournal
LiveJournal is a communication tool that lets people express themselves and connect with friends online. People can use LiveJournal in many different ways: as a private journal, a blog, a social network, and more.

MySpace
MySpace is a social networking website offering an interactive network of photos, blogs, user profiles, groups, and an internal e-mail system.