Nanocompetition
|
|
Nanocompetition is competition for the selection of artefacts that are infinitesimal in size, individually unusable but collectively valuable.
In nanocompetitive processes, very small artefacts are produced by a very big number of peers.
Wikipedia, for example, is a nanocompetitive environment. A large number of participants write and edit articles (i.e. create artefacts). In doing so, each participant competes with others for quality, with the goal of having one's own artefact accepted into Wikipedia, and read by users. While each submission is very small (only a few words), all artefacts together constitute considerable value. Wikipedia therefore can be seen as a competitor "from below" to other encyclopedias.
More examples for nanocompetitive environments include peer archives (dmoz), peer development (Open Source software) and peer journalism (blogs).
The emergence of Nanocompetition as an organizational form, powered by digitization and the Internet, has enabled large-scale organizations of volunteers (dot-org) to complement traditional markets and companies (dot-com) as institutions of production. Individual nano-artefacts cannot be traded economically on classical markets, but compilations of artefacts can expose traditional firms to substantial competition (as does GNU/Linux to Microsoft, for example).
The term "Nanocompetition" was introduced by Christoph Hamann and Simon Peter at Witten/Herdecke University, Germany. It contrasts "Megacompetition", a term coined by Andy Grove for competition by large units.