Proves me wrong: Apple and User-Generated-Advertising
Though I always considered user-generated-advertising as a rather desperate attempt to apply the user-generated-content-mechanism to marketing, Apple and TBWA\Chiat\Day will air a tv-spot that started off as a student project in the U.K. It shows that collaboration between users and companies works as long as it is a controlled process. I think that the idea behind the Citizendium project reflects this notion: In an attempt to further improve the sometimes shallow and incorrect content of Wikipedia they are trying to excert some control over amateur collaboration. By introducing expert supervision they establish a controlling instance and quality management.
I think that the same principle applies to the Apple case: User generated advertising is not about solely putting the consumer in charge, but rather about collaborating with him so that both - the company’s and the user’s knowledge background and abilities - complement one another.