Can collective intelligence produce social innovation?

Abstract

The development of modern information and communication technologies (ICTs) has led to a renewed interest in the phenomenon of 'collective intelligence' (also described as the 'wisdom of the crowds', Surowiecki, 2005). Collective intelligence refers to the capacity to mobilise and coordinate the expertise and creativity possessed by large groups of individuals in order to solve problems and create new knowledge. Although this can be done offline, ICTs make it far easier for large groups of individuals to work collectively on common tasks, for example by removing the need for physical proximity, allowing for asynchronous communication and making it possible for single individuals to transmit information to very large groups (Wellman, 1997). These advantages have allowed online networks to solve iconic mathematics problems (Polymath, 2009; Gowers and Nielsen, 2009), create the world's largest reference work, Wikipedia (Almeida, 2007), and even challenge grandmaster Garry Kasparov to a game of chess (Nielsen, 2011).