Bastiaan Baccarne

Smart ideas for smart cities: investigating crowdsourcing for generating and selecting ideas for ICT innovation in a city context

Within this article, the strengths and weaknesses of crowdsourcing for idea generation and idea selection in the context of smart city innovation are investigated. First, smart cities are defined next to similar but different concepts such as digital cities, intelligent cities or ubiquitous cities. It is argued that the smart city-concept is in fact a more user-centered evolution of the other city-concepts which seem to be more technological deterministic in nature. The principles of crowdsourcing are explained and the different manifestations are demonstrated. By means of a case study, the generation of ideas for innovative uses of ICT for city innovation by citizens through an online platform is studied, as well as the selection process. For this selection, a crowdsourcing solution is compared to a selection made by external experts. The comparison of both indicates that using the crowd as gatekeeper and selector of innovative ideas yields a long list with high user benefits. However, the generation of ideas in itself appeared not to deliver extremely innovative ideas. Crowdsourcing thus appears to be a useful and effective tool in the context of smart city innovation, but should be thoughtfully used and combined with other user involvement approaches and within broader frameworks such as Living Labs.

Empowered Cities? An Analysis of the Structure and Generated Value of the Smart City Ghent

Smart cities have gained momentum as a conceptual model which embodies a fresh wave of techno-optimism and emphasizes the positive effects of ICT and other innovative technologies in a city, often in combination with multidisciplinary collaborative partnerships. This article assesses a series of six smart city initiatives within one local city ecosystem by proposing a conceptual framework which is then used to analyze the architecture, value flows and contextual dimensions of the smart city Ghent. The results of our analysis show the multi-level collaborative value creation potential in a smart city and shed light on the complexity of these processes. The main conclusion is that current smart city initiatives face the challenge of evolving from demonstrators towards real sustainable value. Smart cities often have a technological deterministic, project-based approach, which forecloses a sustainable, permanent and growing future for the project outcomes.