I was listening to this story on NPR about a musician who was creating random songs from random experiences when my creative juices started flowing. I could create a mash-up of existing Web 2.0 technologies to publish collaboratively authored novels that are developed, edited and produced through user contributions (user generated content). This site would combine the creativity of many people with the feedback of even more. Think of it as a novel-based approach to loneygirl15 where the user base develops the direction and also generates the daily content.

The process would be divided into the following areas:

1. Style guidelines
2. Theme selection
3. Content development
4. Production

Style Guidelines

Guidelines would be developed by the users and would be easily available to the authors. The guidelines would direct the style of writing allowing for some conformity in a novel authored by many people. Guidelines may also specify the type of novels produced (science fiction, romance, mystery, etc.). The guidelines are the key to producing a successful novel and must be made easily accessible to all authors, editors and reviewers.

Theme Selection

Users would offer very high-level plots or story lines into a theme pool. That pool would generate interesting themes through a voting and bubbling effect, similar to how stories appear in Digg. The most interesting themes would then be developed until a compelling story line has evolved.

Content Development

The content for the novel can be developed in a wiki-like environment. It would consist of many people contributing story elements and others putting them together, following the high-level outline created during the theme selection and conforming to the style guidelines. Allowing all users to develop and edit content within stated parameters would combine the creativity of many and most likely be greater than the sum of its parts. The site would be self-governing giving the users ultimate control in the outcome of the novels.

Production

A creative commons license could govern the release of the novels turning these user-generated novels into the hands of many. Electronic publishing methods are many and easy to execute making distribution a snap. There are also many options available for printed materials with on-demand printing and publishing available at many web sites. Viral marketing would be a natural byproduct of the process and guaranteed, interesting content would broaden appeal.

Combining style guidelines with an easily accessed and easy-to-use, collaborative environment could possibly create many "best sellers." The tricks are concise guidelines and the right environment.

I’m not a marketing person, but while watching this video on YouTube about a girl toting her addiction to Starbucks really made me think about an interesting marketing medium.

Why not utilize a coupon system over SMS in addition to product placement or promotion to sell products on Internet distributed videos? There are some very bright and creative people out there creating free content for video. Why not entice them to advertise a product and make some money at the same time?

Here’s how it works, using this Starbucks Addict video as an example. Ann (the video’s author) publishes some incredibly witty and clever video that somehow draws thousands or hundreds of thousands of people to watch it. Part of the video advertises Starbucks and there is a coupon offer associated with the video for 10% (or whatever) off.

So far, pretty simple; now to mix in SMS. I saw an article about using your phone as your wallet recently and I put these two ideas together.

Extending the example: to entice both parties to deliver, a single-use coupon code is created that uniquely identifies the offer. A hash is generated that identifies the author of the video, transaction number and expiration date. Of course, the author needs to get a registration key from Starbucks that authorizes the coupon. If the viewer decides they want the coupon, it can be SMS’ed to their phone and stored there. When time comes to use it, the viewer enters the Starbucks and text messages the coupon code to the store which automatically registers the coupon code and credits the video author’s account and also issues the discount for the item. The credit could be a flat fee or a percentange of the item. Everybody wins. The author gets credit for their creative talents, the viewer gets a discount and the product company gets some free advertising. And as a freebie, this method also allows for establishing some excellent metrics by tracking the coupon codes.

This can all be done with existing technology and it would be quite simple to do.

Radical juxtaposition of concepts, isn’t it? Open source and ideas. Wow. Imagine…so many creative people without the means to realize their ideas and others lacking creativity but having deep pockets. Somehow everyone can win, right? Right. It’s time to look at the whole picture. There is a lot of brilliance out there; imagine sharing and combining those ideas. For the greater good. A network of creative thinking for the advancement of … everything. How can black boxes make life better but just for the select few? We need to open the box and invite everyone to participate. I’m adding a new category, “OSI” - Open Source Ideas. Anything posted there is open - open to be expanded upon, open to be utilized; I just ask for credit as the originator and all threads of the ideas contain the same credits.