The Wisdom of Social Media Innovation over the Needs of Online Network Citizens

The Wisdom Of Social Media Innovation

In view of the different ways in which innovation is acquired, Adams, Tranfield, and Denyer (2011) emphasize that the newness or innovativeness of technology is used in much of the research on innovation. The understanding of social media innovativeness helps to develop the dynamics of the innovation process, innovation performance and behavior toward innovation (Garcia & Calantone, 2002). In effect, McCarthy, Ridgway, Leseure, and Fieller (2000) suggest that the basis of innovation attributes relies on the innovation descriptive properties and qualities that innovation possesses. Innovation possesses attributes in accordance with what is assigned by individuals based on their perceptions (Dearing & Meyer, 1994).

With this in mind, innovation is defined by Barnett (1953, p.7) as “any thought, behaviour or thing that is new because it is qualitatively different from existing forms”, or is “perceived as new” (Rogers, 2003). In addition, innovation is conceptualized as a new combination of means and ends (Rickards, 1985), and as the process leading from the invention to the commercial exploitation of a new idea, thus emphasizing that an application for the invention needs to be found (Roberts, 1987). It has also been classified according to its impact. Schumpeter (1934) distinguished between:

• 1.

  Incremental innovation promoting continuous change, and

• 2.

  Radical innovation leading to discontinuous, disruptive changes.

Rogers (2003), in the diffusion of innovation theory, posits that innovation is spread through society based on the S-curve graph, which explains that early adopters of the innovation select technology first, which is then followed by the majority of the public until the innovation is common to everyone. The S-curve is an innovation- and system-specific graph that is used to describe the diffusion of technology among the members of a specific system (i.e. ONCs). In essence, social media, which initially started as a medium of interaction that allowed Internet users to create, generate and exchange media content between users (Kaplan & Haenlein, 2010), and initiate voluntary participation and communication (Zolkepli & Kamarulzaman, 2015), is now at the stage of maturity, which proves that its innovation has already become well-diffused and accepted.