Una terzera via en la produccion de la inonvacion: las relaciones virtuosas entre productores y usuarios de las Tic (Tecnologias de la informacion y comunicacion)

The last twenty years have marked a paradigm shift in the understanding of how innovation actually occurs. The interaction between social and technological networks highlights a third way of producing innovation that is characterized by a pluralization and decentralization of sources of innovation. This marks a form of democratization based on the relationship between producers and users that is defined as a “private collective innovation model.” On the base of empirical study, the paper will provide a framework for this new model, describing characteristics and advantages for SME, big companies and local economy. This innovation model will be described by means of a typology discerning two broad categories: 1) communities of practice of innovation and 2) communities of interest, depending on their orientation more to ethical values of cooperative exchange or more to utilitarian considerations. The aim of this article is to highlight how models of innovation in the ICT sector, strongly marked by open and cooperative relationships, are likely to promote an appropriation and a widespread use of ICT through the involvement and participation of a variety of social actors. Starting from the relationship established between the technologies and its use it could become possible to think of appropriate ICT policies that facilitate the interconnections between people, ideas and resources in different contexts of action. In fact, many innovation policies, including the European ones, are already based on the assumption that promoting innovative processes requires not only an increment of investments in enterprise activities but also an increasing process of mutual involvement of enterprises, public players, research centers and users.