Would you like Fries with that?

http://www.fastcompany.com/news/2008/10/29-intel-asus-wepc-microsoft-xbox-360-avatars.html

How much longer before buying a computer is like going to the drive-through?

I found this article at fastcompany.com, and it's about a new website called WePC. Here's the brief synopsis, taken from the Fast Company article, written by Chris Dannen:

"...users can discuss the ideal features of their dream-laptops, and even “build” a virtual version of their perfect machine. Ideas contributed so far: waterproof keyboards, roll-up displays, complete upgradability, and so on. Naturally, the present-day specs of several Asus/Intel laptops are never more than a click away, lest you create your dream machine and discover that, Lo! It's the same as a computer Asus already makes"

So, clearly there's a dual benefit here: Asus is crowdsourcing their research to you, and when you go to make a recommendation, you find that, sometimes, what you wanted was already there waiting for you! So they not only make you feel like your input is appreciated, but they can make a sale as well, all in the same visit. Pretty clever. This reminds me of something like threadless.com, the t-shirt company who solicits t-shirt designs from the crowd, the crowd then votes, and the winner's design gets sold on their website to the masses. It's also much like the Zara model, where the company takes customer feedback and attempts to implement it - because who knows best what the customer wants? Well, the customer, of course!

So this got me to thinking: how long before buying your computer is like going to the drive through lane at McDonald's? Imagine: you walk into the computer section at Best Buy, pick the components/features/software you need, a technician runs to the back of the store, and 3 minutes later you've got your personalized cpu. Now, if Dell could manufacture a computer in 3 minutes, why couldn't they do it in the backroom at Best Buy? I know the software takes time to test, but surely that process could be sped up. (In fact, the article mentions how Best Buy has already started to do this, with certain models of Toshiba and HP. But it's in its infancy). Now, maybe I'm out-of-touch and this is already happening somewhere, but I haven't seen it yet - at least not to the extent that I'm describing.

The article goes on to talk about how Microsoft's XBox is now customizable in that you can create an avatar that will go with your profile no matter what game you're playing - but this part of the article was of less interest to me.

Anyway, interesting stuff, and I imagine this do-it-yourself computer customization is not far away for us. Would you like software with that?

Crowdsourcing at Presidential Debate No. 2

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJlnwVCA2eY (fast forward to 5:03)

So, last night as I was watching the second presidential debate of the season, about an hour into it, I got really excited about something - Tom Brokaw asked a question about crowdsourcing! This means one of two things: either a.) Jerry's class is, as he promised, incredibly relevant, or b.) I'm a big huge dork. My hunch is that it's some combination of the two, but that's neither here nor there. (Also neither here nor there: did you ever notice that Tom Brokaw has practically no upper lip? Perhaps there's some medical condition he suffers, in which case I'll feel really bad that I'm writing about it, but my girlfriend pointed it out and I had to concur.)

Anyway, thanks to the wonders of DVR, I pressed rewind and listened to the question again, just to be sure. And indeed, while he didn't use the term "crowdsourcing," his question was no doubt a reference to it. Here is what he said (asked directly to Senator McCain as a follow-up to a discussion about alternative energy sources):

"Should we fund a Manhattan-like Project that developed the nuclear bomb to deal with global energy and alternative energy, or should we fund one-hundred thousand garages across America, the kind of industry and innovation that developed Silicon Valley?"

(Click on the link here or at the top of the page and fast forward to 5:03 to see the clip of this).

Now, without revealing my political leanings, I will say that McCain didn't really answer the question. The beginning of McCain's response was as follows:

"I think pure research and development investment on the part of the U.S. Government is certainly appropriate. I think once it gets into the productive stages that we ought to obviously turn it over to the private sector."

After that, as is so often the case in these debates, he veered away from the question to address something Obama had said about him in the previous segment. So, I was disappointed that he didn't directly address the "Manhattan Project vs. 100,000 garages" part of the question, but still, it was pretty cool to see crowdsourcing arise as an issue to be addressed in a presidential debate.

You want my opinion? So glad you asked. I think it would be great for the government to undertake a crowdsourcing project, particularly in terms of renewable energy sources (which I personally think is one of the most critical, if not the single most critical issue facing our country right now). I mean if crowdsourcing has proven so effective for so many coroporations, why couldn't it work for a government project? (Perhaps the government has already used it in ways I am not aware of. If so, please excuse my ignorance).

Anyway, kudos to Tom Brokaw for asking the question and let me reiterate my dissapointment that it didn't get answered.