Some service to you, Dear Reader: I have introduced a whole bunch of new tags (categories) to classify the postings better. And I have re-categorized all previous postings! With more and more content in this blog, it got difficult to find topics related to one area with the rather general topics I had before. So many more sub-categories to allow you to easier navigate the content of this website. Please refer to the cloud list in the left column of the blog for instant access.
Note: What is not included are the 6 years of postings into my old MC newsletter. Please browse these hundreds of old MC-related posts here (I plan to re-post some old but still interesting posts from the 1998-2004 period here).
General Categories:
General: As the label says, all basic MC&OI related things of very general interest.
Customization Trends: What I think is new and may become a trend in mass customization.
Long Tail: This book made a strong case for MC&OI and postings that deal with this variety explosion get this tag.
Open/User Innovation: The general tag for all postings on (lead) user innovation (or: outside innovation, distributed innovation, etc ...).
Co-creation and Crowdsourcing are two related categories: The first is used for all kinds of user-input-contribution-based models, and the latter on explicit strategies of companies to utilize the distributed creativity and knowledge of their users.
Personalization (What is the difference between personalization & customization? Here is my answer).
MC Alternatives: How to fulfill the need for heterogeneous products without messy one-of-a-kind manufacturing
Guest Articles and Interviews refer to others talking about MC&OI in my blog.
MC/OI on the Web is a category referring to links to external sources of information on MC & OI.
Research Studies and academic research on MC&OI
Events in the area, with the special sub-category MCPC 2007 for all information on the upcoming MCPC World Conference in Oct 2007.
Deutsch (in German): Some posts are in German, as they contain information relevant only to those who can understand German.
Case studies: Who is doing what in MC & OI?
Cases Consumer and Cases Industrial are the two previous categorizations. Most posts are in the consumer category. But to get this better structured, the following new tags were introduced (new categories will come with appropriate postings):Service Customization: MC of services -- a future growth field!
Books: Customization of books, print-on-demand, personalization of books.
Clothing: Mass Customization of apparel and related items, with T-Shirts as an own sub-category.
Footwear: Mass customization and some open innovation in footwear, with Sneakers (sport shoes) as a sub-category.
Furniture - Home and related items
Gifts: Products you typically customize to give them as a gift -- or which are nice customizable gifts for the Holidays!MC & Art: Art that refers to customization etc.
Failures and Flaws: What did not work or still needs improvement
Special categories: How to make MC & OI happen
Technologies & Enablers : Postings on all kind of enabling technologies in general.
Co-Design Process: Postings dealing with the process and experiences of customers co-designing their stuff.Offline Customization: Customization is often seen as web-only, but can be a great thing to enhance the store experience.
Virtual Models are one way to do this.
Design theory and concepts for mass customization.
Fabbing: Rapid manufacturing, laser sintering, digital manufacturing -- new manufacturing concepts for MC. Related with this is User Manufacturing, the idea that manufacturers just provide manufacturing capability, and users do the rest.