The buzz word, crowdsourcing, is a great method of distributing a company’s labor throughout the internet. In a WIRED article by Dustin Haisler, the author explains the concept behind crowdsourcing and the many forms it comes in. Crowdsourcing isn’t just outsourcing company tasks such as formatting some rows and columns in an Excel sheet to someone out in South America or asking someone from India to transfer words from a PDF to Word. By Haisler’s example, crowdsourcing isn’t something new or revolutionary, it’s something that is predefined in nature, something called Emergent Behavior. Haisler states “We can observe emergent behavior in everything from ant colonies to the largest of cities. The premise of emergent behavior is that we are all connected through networks (both online & offline) and that we naturally self-organize across our networks to form higher levels of order.” The existence of crowdsourcing also comes in different purposes. Take a look at services like Kickstarter, a website for individuals, groups or organizations to advertise their ideas and collect donators, or backers, to fund their projects. Even places like Fiverr, offer a platform for anyone to advertise their skills and take on jobs such as designing a website, creating a company logo or even voice acting for a small buck. The emergence of crowdsourcing can be seen as a positive thing as it gives anyone the chance to offer their skills and time to others while getting paid for it. Although this is true, this also comes at a cost to professionals in the industry.
Megan McArdle and Jeff Howe from The Atlantic and WIRED respectively, have gone into how those working in the professional field are affected by the boom of crowdsourcing. McArdle shares the story of Charles Murray, a writer who had complained about the New York Times paying him only $75 for his op-ed contributions. The payment might be low but it’s probably a good amount given the prices from Murray’s competitors. As McArdle’s article points out, there are writers like Murray “who would gladly write for the Times op-ed page for free.” Furthermore, McArdle states the New York Times “could easily stop paying for op-ed submissions and it would have no difficulty filling its op-ed page every morning.” But why is that? It’s because of it’s popularity and prevalence in people’s everyday lives. Think about places like YouTube, Flickr, and Wikipedia. These platforms would never exist if it weren’t for the people who upload and contribute willingly. Wikipedia, known to many, houses thousands maybe millions of articles, all contributed by its users who simply love the platform and are willing to upkeep and provide labor without pay. YouTube and Flickr emerged in popularity because of the convenience of sharing content with others. All this, is the same for the New York Times’ op-ed page. There are plenty of users and readers who love the platform that would gladly freely offer their own submissions just to be featured on the page.
Howe’s article points out the competition professional photographers face with the emergence of crowdsourcing. Mark Harmel is a freelance photographer from California who had suffered the same revelation as Murray. He was given a task to photograph sick patients for a project led by Claudia Menashe of the National Health Museum in Washington, DC. After negotiations and discounts, Harmel would profit about $600 for his four camera shots – that’s $150 per photo! Unfortunately for Harmel, the project lead from DC discovered iStockPhoto, a platform for freelance and amateur photographers like Harmel to upload and sell their stock photos. With over 22,000 contributors on the site, each photo charges between $1 and $5. And as Menashe would describe it, the website had “images at very affordable prices”. Menashe bought and used 56 photos from iStockPhoto for about $1 each that same day to complete her project.
It comes as no surprise why professionals like Murray or Harmel are upset about crowdsourcing being a thing. Harmel would sell a portfolio of 100 photographs in 2000 for about $69,000 but with iStockPhoto and other sites offering their low rates, it leaves people like Harmel questioning, “how can I compete with a dollar?” Would it be best to just join in as well?
