We-Think (Hardcover)

by Charles Leadbeater (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review
'Likely to be the most controversial book about the Internet to be published in Britain this year... A highly readable British synthesis of James Surowiecki's Wisdom of the Crowds and Chris Anderson's Long Tail, Leadbeater's We-Think is definitely an important book, even for skeptics like me who are suspicious of the seductive techno-utopian promises of the Web 2.0 revolution.' Andrew Keen, Independent'this is a highly accessible and stimulating introduction to a set of trends that are still very much in their early stages. We should all be thinking a lot harder about where they will lead.' www.charliebeckett.org

Product Description
Society is based not on mass consumption now but on mass, innovative participation - as is clear in phenomena from Wikipedia, Youtube and Craigslist to new forms of scientific research and political campaigning. This new mode of 'We-think' is reshaping the way we work, play and communicate."We-think" is about what the rise of these phenomena (not all to do with the internet) means for the way we organise ourselves - not just in digital businesses but in schools and hospitals, cities and mainstream corporations. For the point of the industrial era economy was mass production for mass consumption, the formula created by Henry Ford; but these new forms of mass, creative collaboration announce the arrival of a new kind of society, in which people want to be players, not spectators.This is a huge cultural shift, for in this new economy people want not services and goods, delivered to them, but tools so they can take part. In "We-think" Charles Leadbeater analyses not only these changes, but how they will affect us and how we can make the most of them. Just as, in the 1980s, his "In Search of Work" predicted the rise of more flexible employment, here he outlines a crucial shift that is already affecting all of us.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 290 pages
• Publisher: Profile (January 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1861978928
• ISBN-13: 978-1861978929
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.1 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #806,543 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars We-Think and Leadership, July 6, 2009

By	James Rea - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: We-Think: Mass innovation, not mass production (Paperback)

How many hours per day do you spend on social media? I spend a couple, but then I can watch a DVR'd Daily Show at the same time as I tweet, linkedin, blog and forum. I'm guessing that my wife, an author of a book and at least three professional and one personal blogs, spends quite a bit more time than that. One informal tweet of "How Much Time Do You Spend on Social Media?" resulted in as many as 8, 10 and maybe 15 hours per day. Fortunately, I thank Charles Leadbeater's book "We-Think - Mass innovation, not mass production" in the assurance that this is not all wasted time. We-Think is a topic all its own, and I'm not sure that I fully agree with the entire publication. But that's sort of the point. Social media allows an enormously large venue for people, voluntarily, purely for the fun of it, to participate in ideas. While all those tweets, blogs, and forums allow for an inordinate amount of "I think" dogmatism, collectively the ability for people to participate and respond in a global open forum can result in a "We Think" response. One that, when the collective works effectively, can produce far more innovative thinking, far faster than has historically been possible.

I believe that We Think will play an ever-increasing role in innovation, and on how leaders will need to lead businesses in the future.

[...]

5.0 out of 5 stars Applying Web Trends & Bottom-Up Collaboration To Worldwide Innovation and Development, June 27, 2009

By	Ira Laefsky "Ira Laefsky" (Philadelphia, PA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: We-Think: Mass innovation, not mass production (Paperback)

Many of the trends and ideas described by Charles Leadbeater are well known to readers of business and technology publications. These include the power of Web and Internet Communication, new Collaborative and Virtual Organizations, and the quality and pervasiveness of Open Source efforts. There is a certain correspondence between the observations of this excellent volume and Clay Shirky's widely popular "Here Comes Everybody". But the novelty and emergent necessity of this volume lies in how these observations are applied by an International Consultant who advises worldwide corporate leaders and several European government organizations on achieving innovation.

Mr. Leadbeater offers insightful models of how bottom-up distributed innovation has had success in widely divergent technologies and geographies. These include his "Pro-Am" model of amateur do-it-yourself innovators delivering leading contributions and products above the quality of professionals employed by corporate giants; and his "pebbles" versus "boulders" model of bottom-up small scale innovation.

The excellent writing in this volume goes beyond telling a good story about technology, society and collaboration; he describes how these trends which individually have been observed by many business and technology pundits can be applied to achieving corporate, national and global innovation in the future. As a British and European expert who has advised governments and global corporations, Mr. Leadbeater brings new insight to those who have observed these trends chiefly in the American environment.

--Ira Laefsky