Crowd engineering
Crowd engineering (from English crowd for '(human) crowd', and engineering for 'development of technical solutions'; see also “wisdom of the crowd”) or crowdworking is the development of technical content by a Group of motivated users, e.g. B. via appropriate platforms. This designation is based on the term crowd sourcing , in which volunteers contribute to subtasks, the maturity of which is unspecific.
Projects
The topic of crowd engineering is currently beginning to gain relevance. Due to the lack of tools to support crowd engineering processes, the first applications take place exclusively in the protected space of projects.
RoboPORT - Robotic Platform and Open Repository for Toolkits
The " RoboPORT Project - Robotic Platform and Open Repository for Toolkits" funded in the framework program PAiCE aims to make innovative development approaches usable for robotics and to support the reusability of solutions that have already been developed. Under the direction of two research institutes ( Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Engineering IAO and Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Engineering and Automation ) operate innovative companies (Interfaces GmbH and innosabi GmbH), large companies (BSH Home Appliances Group) and the University of Stuttgart (Institute for Industrial Science and Technology Management and Institute for Industrial Manufacturing and Factory Management).
As part of the RoboPORT project, a cooperative and distributed development platform for collaboration between various stakeholders is to be developed. Those involved can range from end customers to differently organized production units and networks to individual developers. Every platform user can access and use modules of the platform. In return, he brings his experience and knowledge to the developed product or current project. By involving everyone in the product development process, everyone can develop their own individual business model based on technology, knowledge and experience. With the incentives created by new business models, the RoboPORT platform offers added value for all participants.
The commercial use of the RoboPORT platform is achieved through the modeling of workflows. This enables competence analysis and management, which increases its commercial usability. Because for products for which companies have product liability, functional safeguards and documentation for operation at the customer's premises are a prerequisite. The digital consistency is ensured by the modeled workflows. The data can be used completely and in a variety of ways without media breaks. By providing communication interfaces to external parties, the realization of products is supported and new production networks and ecosystems become possible.
Similar approaches
Interactive value creation
Crowd engineering and interactive value creation are in principle very close, but should not be confused with one another, since interactive value creation is more related to the entrepreneurial side and neglects self-organized associations, which are, however, elementary for crowd engineering . Interactive value creation often originates from consumer dissatisfaction and is concerned with developing a better solution.
Open innovation
Open Innovation emphasizes the open innovation process, which is also central to crowd engineering . Open innovation can take place as a process upstream of crowd engineering . This means that external employees are involved in a previously internal value creation process (the innovation process). As with crowd engineering , open innovation is also about overcoming company boundaries. The difference to crowd engineering is that only innovations are generated. The following steps to implement the innovation take place without the interaction of the crowd.
Crowd knowledge sourcing
In the Stop Child Abuse project, Europol is asking the population to identify everyday objects from child pornographic film and photo material on a website. Europol hopes that this will provide information on victims, crime scenes and perpetrators. The method is called crowd-knowledge-sourcing by the investigators .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Robotic Platform and Open Repository for toolkits - RoboPORT project
- ↑ Europol shows clues from child abuse images to track offenders . ( bbc.com [accessed January 8, 2019]).