The linking of network technology to both a new labor regime and superior smartness is given a concrete example in the article. Melcarek, the aforementioned protagonist physicist, is reported to have solved a problem posted by Colgate-Palmolive, earning \$25,000.<sup>6</sup> The article reckons that “paying Colgate-Palmolive’s R&D staff to produce the same solution could have cost several times that amount—if they even solved it at all” (Howe 2006). But again, the story is not simply about costs. The reason why Melcarek could come up with the solution, which he admits “was really a very simple solution,” while the R&D department at Colgate-Palmolive could not is explained in terms of the structural limitations of the traditional R&D: bureaucratic, hierarchized, stiff, and rigid. While at Colgate-Palmolive’s R&D the task of solving a toothpaste tube–related problem was assigned to “test tube guys,” the solution Melcarek came up with required “training in physics” (Howe 2006), which he possessed. In other words, for Colgate-Palmolive, crowdsourcing was a matter not just of reducing costs of development but of being able to come up with a smarter solution by tapping into skills and talent they did not have and that in fact they did not know they needed.
Here, too, crowdsourcing is presented as rational and advantageous not only from the point of view of companies and the system as a whole but from that of individuals as well. Melcarek’s arrival at the position of a “solver”—as the crowd is referred to on the InnoCentive Web site<sup>7</sup>—is described as the happy culmination of a bumpy professional road. His studies in physics were followed by “a succession of ‘unsatisfactory’ engineering jobs . . . none of which fully exploited Melcarek’s scientific training or his need to tinker”; after all, the article concludes, “not every quick and curious intellect can land a plum research post at a university or privately funded lab” (Howe 2006).
This mismatch between Melcarek’s talent and a work position, in the traditional sense of the term, was accompanied by his reluctance to work in “a 9-to-5 environment.” Crowdsourcing is presented as a solution to the limitations put forth by the traditional job market, which consists of positions (which are located at definite and stable points in space and time) that are part of a career path. These are seen as close-ended and restrictive, in contrast to the open-ended and flexible character of employment afforded by network production, which is specifically adept at exploiting the full potentiality of individuals. From the point of view of his personal work life “for Melcarek, InnoCentive has been a ticket out of this scientific backwater” (Howe 2006). Melcarek’s work life is more free and liberated in another sense as well. His work takes place within a physical and temporal environment of leisure. Melcarek’s lab is described as a “‘weekend crash pad,’ a one-bedroom apartment littered with amplifiers, a guitar, electric transducers, two desktop computers, a trumpet, half of a pontoon boat, and enough electric gizmos to stock a RadioShack,” and he is doing his work there “on most Saturdays.”<sup>8</sup> Having the temporal and spatial freedom that Melcarek enjoys and at the same time taking part in the loop of production is made infinitesimally easier, according to the digital discourse, with network production.
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Media and New Capitalism in the Digital Age