I recently completed reading Henry Chesbrough's book Open Business Models. I don't really recommend the book unless (1) you're in the business of trading patents or (2) are an executive who deals with cutting-edge technology that is not really web technology (i.e. RFID, nanotechnology, genetic engineering, robotics, etc).

The book did, however, offer a classification system that presents six types of innovation models that can be used to classify all companies. For web companies that are committed to open innovation, two out of the six types of innovation are particularly relevant:

Externally Aware. This is the type of innovation model that I am using with ActoNetwork; it is one in which product development (and hence, R&D) is focused on identifying how technology external to the firm can be used to satisfy business objectives. It is also one in which the marketing department is critical to leading innovation, as these types of companies often leverage external technology to create custom solutions for customers. I think this type of innovation model is really going to be great for companies that don't have the capital or know-how to hire a big software development team. The capital savings are immense here, and I think we'll see many web startups go this route over the next few years -- especially startups that are marketing/customer service oriented. Because it's critical to enabling lower costs, I think we'll see externally aware innovation converge in a way with microfinance.

Companies that leverage "open process networks" -- in other words, take the time to familiarize themselves with niche ecosystems so that they can leverage the ecosystem to build custom solutions for their customers -- are the most prominent example of companies with an externally aware innovation focus. Web development agencies and search marketing firms are often the types of companies that have this type of innovation model.

Platform Shapers. This is what we all know is hot. Google is the shaper of the web in its current incarnation, although potential rivals that come to mind are:

1. web services with developer communities; examples include social networks (Facebook, MySpace, Ning, LinkedIn), start pages (Pageflakes, Netvibes), CRM applications (Salesforce)

2. open source production communities; examples include content management systems (Wordpress, vBulletin), CRM applications (SugarCRM)

As I've written before, the web services players are setting themselves up to build infrastructure costs -- which is another way of saying they are setting themselves up to compete directly with Google at what they do best. This is why I think the web services companies with developer communities that end up becoming successful will end up striking some type of deal with the almighty G; the economics almost require it. In my opinion, it won't be disruptive.

If web services companies will have a tough time disrupting Google as the platform shaper of the web, how might an open source production community do it? Well, the strategy might revolve around having each open source production community "phone home" so that user profiles are centralized. This is what I think Facebook should be doing and what vBulletin should be doing. Of course, since everything is open source, phoning home could easily be cut out, and thus participants would need to choose to be a part of the centralization (and thus the core would need to incentivize the edge to join -- a road that would likely lead to profit sharing, and eventually the edge owning the core). Likewise, companies that did not jump start the open source production community could come in and create their own add-on that phones home to their own servers, and thus could aggregate user profiles that way. Alternatively, firms could allow users to download data and easily decide which communities they want to participate in (the strategy I am leaning towards).

Either way, once we go open source, the firm that develops the software may not necessarily be the one that gets the highly coveted user profile. It won't be about technology; it'll be about trust.