In Web 2.0 services, Design is the work of Multiple Authors. .. .

In open-sourced communities as this diagram illustrates, “the order comes from within these communities not from the top” (Leadbeater 5). In such an equal platform, ‘Consumers turn out to be producers as creativity becomes a mass activity not just an elite one.’(Leadbeater 5-6).

In the photo-sharing site Flickr, user participation flows in both directions, where contributions are circulated and re-circulated. In Flickr it its not the photos, but what users do with the photos that puts the mechanism of Design into action. In this user-generated medium, the enrichment of a user experience becomes the primary focus, as our methods of content exposition gives our online activities meaning and purpose.


Summary of findings from Flickr Case Study in Thesis:

Strengths
• There are strong levels of feedback, since all users are in fact contributors.
• Flickr’s open API allows for the development on new features, through the modification of JavaScript.
• Flickr facilitates for creative dialogues between members, where users practices tasks of listening, thinking, and speaking.
• Flickr’s responsive and participatory nature helps to immerse users into their engagement of the service.
• Flickr’s multiple approaches to organization supports greater navigational variations.

Weaknesses
• A folksonomy has a tendency to be ambiguous, as users assign the same tag to different items.
• Users are only granted a finite amount of control of the system, which hinders autonomy and self-expression.
• Users without knowledge of JavaScript can’t make sophisticated modifications.
• Flickr chooses to ignore, rather than devise solutions for members who user Flickr for non-photographic material.

Opportunities
• A folksonomy allow all users to have a “voice” to negotiate the value and meaning of communal content.
• Flickr offers users various choices for archiving, annotating, appropriating and recirculating their generated content.
• Flickr allows users to utilize their content, in and amongst other Web 2.0 services they belong to.
• A designer belonging to Flickr can aim to respond to the challenge of multiple ways that users access information.