Crowdsourcing 2010: Behind the3six5 Project

An experiment in the collaborative authorship of history and our collective reality.

Today, we’re picking the brains behind the3six5 — a new blog-project that invites a different, often famous, person to write an entry for each of the 365 days in 2010, essentially crowdsourcing a snapshot of the year. So far, the project has enlisted a varied spectrum of personalities — from writers to comedians to TED speakers to, well, us. (Mark your calendars — we’re going on February 9.)

We sit down with co-conspirators Len Kendall and Daniel Honigman for a chat about the inspiration behind the3six5, its challenges and its ultimate goals.

Hey guys, good to have you. Tell us a bit about yourselves, your background and your brand of curiosity.

Len: I’m a Chicago native, a first generation member of my family, and a digital marketing guy. My brand of curiosity stems from my desire to always be learning and discovered. I’m a self proclaimed “Expert at Nothing” which is a personal reminder to never consider myself a master of any discipline.

My career is a direct result of my interest in bridging creativity and business. I’ve spent time at 2 Chicago ad agencies focusing on digital media and currently am helping lead the charge of “Digital PR” at Golin Harris Chicago where I work with over a dozen major brands.

Daniel: I’m a news guy. I fell in love with journalism when I was an undergrad in college, and I moved to Chicago to study it. I started my career as a reporter, and then sort of fell into the digital/social media world when I started to cover it.

I then landed a gig at the Chicago Tribune as its first social media “person,” where I created and ran its Colonel Tribune persona, after which I then moved up to lead social media strategy for all Tribune newspapers and television sites. I started at Weber Shandwick in June 2009, where I work with brands to interact with consumers and best tell their stories digitally.

Whether I’m working with brands, or consulting with news organization or local businesses, my passion is working with others to help them tell their stories. I enjoy pushing the envelope, and I enjoy helping others think outside of the box.

How and when did the idea for the3six5 first come up?

Len: Daniel and I are very entrepreneurial in nature and many of our discussions over cigars will revolve around potential projects we can team up on. This particular idea came up over the course of a few months and we decided to act on this one as it merged our interests of journalism, marketing, and technology (also not to mention a low cost of entry).

Daniel: We were talking one day about doing a similar storystreaming project for the city of Chicago, actually. We would gather folks from all sorts of life in town: athletes, politicians, artists and some regular, hardworking folks from the city and invite them to tell their stories.

We figured that it could be quite difficult to find 365 in Chicago, and we wanted to try to incorporate a more global perspective for the3six5 project, so we opened it up.

We know from psychology that two people may undergo the exact same experience yet walk away with drastically different interpretations of and sentiments about it. Curating the lineup of contributors will thus be critical to the project’s final product. So, in a way, you’re outsourcing the content but shaping the course of it yourselves — how do you feel about that?

Len: Regardless of a person’s digital or offline footprint, we ultimately have no idea what kind of content is going to be produced over the 365 days of 2010.

No one can predict what will be taking place in the world that day and no one can predict what factors will be affecting the lives of our 365 authors in the future. All we can try to do is find people who we believe are creative, quality writers, and have a unique life experience to date.

Daniel: I feel great about that. With any big crowdsourced project (e.g. Drew McLellan and Gavin Heaton’s Age of Conversation projects) there must be a theme. There must be guidance. We want to give our contributors an idea of what they could and should be writing, as far as format, types of content, etc., but we want to give as much flexibility as possible as to the actual content itself. Think of the3six5 is a collaborative diary for the year 2010.

We’re big believers in eclecticism and the cross-pollination of ideas. Are you making an effort to ensure a diverse lineup from a wide spectrum of disciplines, or are you focusing more on social media personalities? What’s your selection process for the authors?

Len: The easiest route here would obviously be to leverage our social media channels to find authors, but Daniel and I knew that the variety of perspectives would suffer. We’re using social media as a starting point for exploration and discovery.

Through both of our usage of Twitter we’ve been able to bridge relationships with people offline and in industries that are polar opposite from our own.

Sure, some of our authors may have a social media presence, but we’re looking for people who are well-versed across different types of subject matter. Having variety is critical to this project, otherwise it will just sound like a diary written by one person which is the exact opposite of what we’re trying to achieve.

Daniel: Successful social media efforts happen both online and offline, therefore, we didn’t want to limit this project to people we know online. We hope this project brings people together. We hope this project introduces folks to others they never would have met otherwise. That’s what will make the3six5 so much fun.

“Lifestreaming” has evolved from musings on one’s immediate cirumstances in personal blogs to broader reflections on the chancing social, technological and cultural landscape – just look at some of the big-name blogs, from TechCruch to BoingBoing. How do you see the idea of content curation fitting in with lifestreaming?

Daniel: For A Day in the Sun, the Austin American-Statesman’s crowdsourced news project, editors and reporters received content from Austinites first, and then posted it to the web. For an open brandstream — aggregated or published — it’s easy to flood the stream with all sorts of content the brand may not want.

Therefore, for brands and news organizations to take advantage of lifestreaming platforms, the actual content, if crowdsourced, has to be verified and of an agreed upon standard.

This is not to say content in an individual’s lifestream isn’t curated. By reading an article and posting a link or other content, users are curating their own content in real time, whether they know it or not.

The purpose of a lifestream is to publish one’s digital activities for others’ benefit. Not everything you’ll read or do can — or should — be shared for others. Therefore, not ALL content should go in a lifestream.

My take is that for crowdsourced lifestream projects to be successful, editors must establish clear guidelines.

A key criticism of the web is the dilution of authorship — it’s often hard and sometimes even impossible to track down the true origin and author of a piece of information online. Would you say the preservation of authorship is important in writing our own history as a society and civilization?

Len: I have mixed emotions on this topic. On one hand, if we don’t preserve authorship, then there will be less motivation for people to create content.

Let’s be honest, we’re a proud species and if we’re not getting credit for something we created, we aren’t going to want to continue. That being said, from the audience’s perspective, there isn’t much concern about who or where content comes from, we just want it to be of substance.

With the3six5 we’re going to do our best to make it very clear of who the author is each day. By showing readers a different author each day, we’re reminding them that the story is coming from a different perspective. Unlike reading a book, here the audience needs to reset its expectations each day in regards to style and personality.

Daniel: People steal credit for other people’s work — and have done so — for thousands of years. As we move forward, and with more information readily available, it’s going to be incumbent upon us to cite our original source material, as this will only lend more credence to our own original thoughts, when we do have them.

Well, thanks for letting us pick your brains. Any last thoughts left unpicked?

Len: Thank you for taking the time to share our project. I’d like to take this opportunity to point your readers to our listing on Kickstarter. Although the3six5 does not require any money to work, our ultimate plan is to publish 2010 as a hard copy book and as such, we would love to have assistance with the potential publishing process. Donations will go towards buying a future book, and also an additional copy for an author of the3six5.

Details are available here.

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Exclusive Interview with Society6’s Justin Wills

Art in the era of commerce, or what crowdsourcing has to do with the risk of selling out.

Yesterday, we looked at Kickstarer, a bold effort to fund creative endeavors.

Today, we’re pickings the brains behind society6 — a revolutionary platform for empowering artists by connecting them with supporters and matching them with grants.

Co-founder Justin Wills dishes on everything that makes this movement brilliant, and then some.

Hey Justin, good to have you. Tell us a bit about your background and your relationship with the art world.

Thank you so much Maria, glad to be invited for a good ole’ brain picking. For a little background, society6 is a collaboration between Justin Cooper, Lucas Tirigall-Caste and myself. My partners and I are each an equal mix of artist, patron, entrepreneur and geek. We have collectively built many web sites & applications, led creative teams, started businesses and, above all expressed, our creativity through various forms of art and design. None of us are art world insiders by any means, in fact I would say we are definitely outsiders of the “art world”. That said, the recent movements in the arts and creativity have been trending away from this establishment, making society6 even more relevant.

What was the original inspiration, that first a-ha moment, behind society6?

Our good friend, who also happens to be my wife, had an opportunity to show her project during the prestigious Art Basel show in Miami. The project, titled HEROES & VILLAINS, includes photographic portraits of nearly 200 artists from all over the world.

At the time, she didn’t have the money or resources to pay for the show’s prints and framing. She tried to raise the money from sponsors directly, seeking funding from brands and grants, writing proposal after proposal. When this was unsuccessful, she simply wasn’t able to attend and show her project at that time.

HEROES & VILLAINS: Anders Nilsen

Photography by Tatiana Wills & Roman Cho

This is when we knew there was a problem.

HEROES & VILLAINS: Shepard Fairey

Photography by Tatiana Wills & Roman Cho

Artists with great talent and great work were not getting access to the resources and opportunities they needed and deserved. In fact, there was a huge number of both emerging and established artists being underserved all over the world. We felt that this also kept supporters of the arts from experiencing art they would otherwise enjoy.

HEROES & VILLAINS: Travis Millard

Photography by Tatiana Wills & Roman Cho

So we got together and decided to create an ecosystem for artists and supporters from all over the world. As we did this, we were very conscious of a few things: 1) involving peers and supporters in the process and 2) not requiring artists to create spec work to submit to these grants.

We wanted artists who are already doing great work to get the money and resources they need.

Traditionally, both the artist’s creative process and the art consumer’s internal dialogue with a work of art have been private experiences. But Society6 seems to bridge the two in a social context, harnessing the power of crowdsourced art curation. What are the advantages and challenges of this approach?

Many people experience art as a final product. Generally the artist’s process is largely hidden from the viewer and, frankly, this is one of the reasons many people think creating art is simply a talent and not a labor or learned skill. We really wanted to bring art lovers and supporters into the process. That’s why we created the Studio feature of society6. Supporters and peers experience the virtual studio of the artist, where an artist can share their process as well as the end result. If they experience the development of the artist and their work, we believe that everyone will increase their appreciation for both.

Previously, we worked on an online platform that helped companies use crowdsourcing to improve their products and services. What we learned from this experience has been quite helpful in designing society6 and led us to take this approach to curation.

The benefits of involving everyone in the curation of the work is that it expands the audience and increases their emotional connection to the art and the artist. The challenge lies in keeping it merit-based and not just a popularity contest. The most popular stuff tends to stay popular and the things that appeal to the broadest audience dominate. We have worked to avoid this issue when building our system.

Our Charts are one example of how we have tried to solve this — they show Top Studios only show within the last 7 days, so there is decay to the promotions they receive. At the end of the day, you won’t stay on the Charts unless you are continuing to contribute good work.

Secondly, when it came to the grants system, we wanted to make sure we harnessed the community to help filter the grant applicants without this becoming the deciding factor in who is awarded the grant. Community nominations create the finalist list, but ultimately the grant-giver selects from this list to make the award. It’s about balancing the use of a system with an individual point of view in order to achieve a fair and manageable result.

Tell us a bit more about the “business model” behind society6 and how you envision the future of art in the context of the financial backing that sustains it. The future of creativity in the era of commerce, if you will.

We are working to create a marketplace of money and opportunity. We are always designing so that everyone who participates in society6 is both contributing and receiving something in return. We are focused on creating the most useful and mutually beneficial system we can. Keeping this focus will create numerous opportunities for us to sustain society6.

As people become more engaged in the arts and more in touch with the artists they enjoy, more artist will be able to sustain themselves through direct relationships with their supporters.

I am sure we will see a change in many of the organizations that are currently in place in the arts, whether they’re non profits, galleries, stores, or something else. As artists become more connected to their “customer” and more self-reliant, these entities will need to adapt.

Our hope is that society6 is both the driver for this change and the platform for everyone’s continued involvement and success.

Do you approach sponsors and prospective grant-givers, or do they approach you? Do you have any selection criteria, or can any company offer a grant?

The concept of anyone giving a grant by way of a simple online form is a novel one. So, today, we do approach many of the potential grant givers to introduce the concept. We have had a few grants given without soliciting them and we believe this will increase as we grow and eventually be the dominant behavior.

We have very little in terms of restrictions for who can give and what the grant can be. Any individual or organization can give a grant of either money or an opportunity. At the end of the day, if it is not a good grant, people won’t apply.

The only strong suggestion we have for grant givers is not to solicit submissions as part of the grant.

It’s not a contest and we want artists to be able to apply with their studio and feel that their existing work is what is being evaluated, not a submission created specifically for the grant.

It’s more of a rolling process that favors the way in which artists like to operate. We want the grants to be in the best interest of the artists. Let’s face it: As a grant giver, you are going to be doing good, but you are also getting some promotion out of this so be creative and generous in your grant.

It’s tricky to talk about creative output and commerce in the same breath. Even though society6 is community-driven, some would argue the mere knowledge of prospective funding may alter artists’ original work. How do you think society6 is walking the line between art supporters simply financing original art, and grant-givers being pegged as mere corporate sponsors “commissioning” creative work? The sell-out risk, in other words.

Because no work is being specifically produced for the grant, the artist can post and show work parallel to the grant and not just because of the grant. That said, it is certainly true that we hope the presence of the grants encourages people to post often and consider the quality and depth of their work.

So far, we ‘ve been pleased to see that people take advantage of society6 and use the full breadth of the platform, including things like our Twitter integration. The presence of money and opportunities has not disrupted the community and the positive interaction between the members.

Thanks for letting us pick your brains, Justin. Any parting thoughts left unpicked?

You’re welcome, it’s a pleasure to have our brains picked.

A few parting thoughts: At its core, society6 is a simple and powerful platform for artists to share their work and for their supporters to interact with them. Many people are enjoying it without participating in the grants, which are only part of the overall platform.

But it’s also important to note that we are not a non-profit and have made this choice in order to work outside of the constraints of this traditional system. That is not to say that we don’t feel non-profits are necessary and useful, we do. It’s just that we believe we’ll be more nimble and offer greater opportunities if we can continue to operate with fewer restrictions.

Our only stakeholders are the artists and creative people around the world. We listen closely to them and do what we think will best serve their interests.

Kickstarter: Crowdsourced Culture-Funding

Legal love from strangers, or what The Kinks have to do with Denver’s homeless.

Here’s a reality check: Creativity is the business of ideas. Which means it’s just that — a business. Anything, from putting up an art show to recording an album to running a more serious blog, requires some level of funding. Which can be tough, if you’re doing it out of your living room — as many artists are.

Luckily, there’s Kickstarter — a new platform for funding ideas and creative endeavors.

The concept is brilliantly simple: Creators — artists, designers, filmmakers, musicians, journalists, inventors, bloggers, explorers — post a project that needs funding and set a donation period. Then people begin pledging money. The “pledge” is actually a commitment that you’ll donate the promised amount, but is collected only if a project reaches or exceeds its funding goal before time expires — even if a project is just $1 short when the time expires, no money is collected.

In return, project creators can offer products and services — from a hot air balloon ride to free CD’s — to their backers, as well as exclusive project updates.

Currently, Kickstarter features an incredible diversity of creative endeavors — from a photography project about the homeless, to one man’s quest to reunite The Kinks, to the world’s first crowdsourced book. Some are quirky, some are just fun, but some ring with a sense of incredible urgency, revealing just how cornered by circumstances the project creator is and how Kickstarter is the only straw of salvation.

Case in point: Polyvinyl’s plea to save 10,000 records from destruction. A little background: Polyvinyl is one of our favorite labels, featuring indie icons like Architecture In Helsinki, Of Montreal, Mates of State, and Asobi Seksu, among others. Their distributor’s warehouse recently got severely downsized and threatened to destroy 10,000 records due to high storage costs. Beyond the absurd wastefulness, Polyvinyl simply wouldn’t part with this incredible heritage. So they asked people to chip in to have the records shipped to their office and clear out some space to store them. In return, backers would get various tiers of CD & DVD goodies from the label’s roster, depending on the donation amount.

Polyvinyl loyalists met the $1,000 goal mere hours after the project was posted. With 42 days still to go, the effort is already 233% funded. The story here is not just one of financial support, but also of incredible, moving brand love and encouragement. As a result, Polyvinyl decided to dream big and shoot for full financial freedom by completely emptying their overstock — a $18,000 endeavor.

Kickstarter is currently invite-only, but if you’re a creator looking to get a project funded, you can apply to join. Meanwhile, you can follow @kickstarter on Twitter for updates, and stalk your way to public alpha.

via TED Blog

Curating Twitter: Three Hand-Picked Must-Follows

Because #followfriday is insufficient, props are to be given, and we like Big Words.

Twitter is quickly evolving into a superb way to discover fascinating content you normally wouldn’t have, by following interesting people who tweet with great editorial curation. The key, of course, is exercising your own curatory judgment in identifying said interesting people. And since we’ve been in the business of sparing you unnecessary curatory work since 2006, here’s some help — 3 incredible Twitter personas on whom we have a massive, butterflies-in-the-brain culture-crush.

NICK BILTON

Nick Bilton may work at a pillar of traditional media — The New York Times, to be exact — but his interests are closer to what we like to call enlightened futurism: Cultural and technological innovation of the most compelling kind. You can count on him for a steady stream of fascination across technology, new-age publishing, media, data visualization and miscellaneous finds of cultural relevance.

Nick may tweet infrequently, but when he does, it’s quality stuff.

Stats:

• Followers: 3,072
• Following: 342
• Tweets/day: 0.8

BBH LABS

Underwritten by Mel Exon and Ben Malbon, @BBHLabs is the Twitter outpost of — you guessed it — NY-and-London-based neo-agency BBH Labs.

These guys just “get it” — “it” being all the diverse incarnations of the business of ideas, from design to advertising to social media to interactive wizardry. Mostly, they seem to share our belief that the future of the marketing and advertising industry is not in the pushing of product but in the pulling of ideas — from innovators, from artists, from various cultural agents who pursue their own passions that may just so happen to make for great marketing.

You can count on @BBHLabs for a variety of creative explorations, but especially for bleeding-edge developments across data visualization and crowdsourcing.

Stats:

• Followers: 2,888
• Following: 802
• Tweets/day: 3.6

CHRIS ANDERSON

If you’ve been reading Brain Pickings, you’re well familiar with TED and thus with Chris Anderson — TED’s brilliant curator but oh-so-much-more.

Unlike most people who tweet as the “public face” of a big organization or institution (sorry, @SamsungMobileUS), Chris goes well beyond simply promoting TED’s (already fascinating) content and actually walks the walk of what TED stands for — ideas worth spreading — sharing brilliant ones across all facets of culture: Design, art, sustainability, technology, social media, philanthropy and miscellaneous curiosity about the world.

Chris also writes The Untweetable — a roomier outpost for insight that can’t be contained in 140 characters. There, you’ll find anything from the continuation of compelling, heated Twitter discussions to bonus content beyond Twitter to original social media experiments.

He comes with our highest stamp of approval — a rare combination of superb editorial judgment, compelling cultural curiosity and, to use a TEDism, incredible moral imagination.

Stats:

• Followers: 100,422
• Following: 269
• Tweets/day: 5.6