I’ve noticed a growing trend in the web towards crowd-oriented applications e.g. websites that allow groups of people to make various decisions and work together. An obvious example would be wikipedia but I’m talking here more about real crowd-buying applications like e.g. CrowdStorm which is soon going to roll out new version of their site, or HalfShare which took the concept of crowd-shopping to the extreme when it comes to the object that we are actually purchasing… (a house).

The first site - CrowdStorm - is letting users build a wiki/community-style content over a database of products, and find those which generate the most “buzz”. The purchase action however, is performed by yourself alone. You only get “influenced” e.g. by recommendations of others etc. The “crowd” in the name is then only helping you chose what to buy. “Informing” is therefore a stage one of “crowd”-oriented web.

The second website however, takes the concept one step forward, by letting you find other people interested in investing in properties (second / summer houses), e.g. you might not have enough money to invest in a second house on a booming market on your own, BUT you and 10 other people could handle it together - and if you then sell the property in 10 years time, all of you will make a profit. In a way - allowing users to buy something together, is therefore a stage two of “crowd”-oriented web.

What I’m interested in however, is how this concept of “crowd-shopping” starts to resemble a classic concept of public companies or investments companies (like VCs). We seek informations based on authority of others and “experts’ “analysis of markets trends (newspapers, technical analysis etc.), then we invest capital into our crowd-fractional-property (whatever it is), and hope to sell it with a profit within some time. We don’t really own the object of the purchase, nor we bound ourselves with it emotionally - investing in equities of public companies is all crowd-based, social way to make profit for all interested parts (investors).

Shouldn’t then, the next step after “Crowd-shopping” as presented in HalfShare.com be “crowd investing” where e.g. people (private investors) would vote online and invest in any business ventures they are interested in - and capital seekers could present their idea and try to raise seed capital in exchange for shares in their business?

Crowd-VC? And why not.