THE INVISIBLE college was a loose aggregation of 17th-century scientists and scholars across a number of disciplines who used the technology of the day to exchange ideas and information. One could see this information network as the beginning of today's academic elite or, at a stretch, characterise it as the first example of crowdsourcing. Wired writer Jeff Howe is firmly in the latter camp.

Crowdsourcing is a term invented by Howe to cover a range of web-based collaborative efforts taking in focus groups, open-source software development and the automated computer “piece work” of initiatives such as SETI.

There is a growing tide among the creative and scientific communities to harness the enthusiasm and inspiration of huge crowds of internet users. Some of the projects are idealistic, some merely cost-cutting. Howe, in his book, lovingly catalogues them all.

Indeed, the centre section of this book is a breathlessly enthusiastic roll call of outstanding crowdsourcing ideas. Threadless, a site that invites users to upload their T-shirt designs and then vote to select the most commercial ones that are then sold to the community that created them, earns particular approbation from Howe. He's very fond of iStockPhoto too. There is even a look forward to the paradigm's migration from the realm of information to the physical world when personal fabricating machines become commercially available.

It's an intoxicating vision of a decentralised future led by “groupthink”, but one that seems to leave little room for contemporary institutions with their old-fashioned checks and balances. It's a vision, too, that lacks any reliable revenue stream for the content creators and editors, who are expected to participate in crowdsourced enterprises in their spare time.

For the first two thirds of the book potential downsides of the crowdsourcing phenomenon are conspicuously absent. Howe fleetingly acknowledges Andrew Keen's digital age jeremiad The Cult of the Amateur but there are few speed bumps on his headlong rush into a wiki-tomorrow.

Only in the closing chapters does the book move toward a balanced account of this possibly world-changing development that has already affected everything from pornography to cancer research. That's a shame, because once he hits his stride Howe is an informed and enthusiastic guide to the new collaborative creativity.

Crowdsourcing: How the Power of the Crowd is Driving the Future of Business by Jeff Howe
Random House, £17.99; 320pp Buy the book

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