In his blog post "Crowdsourcing: A Million Heads is Better than One", Josh Catone theorized that "Crowdsourcing can be broken down in to three categories: 1. creation (like Wikipedia);
2. prediction (like Yahoo! Buzz); and
3. organization (like Google)."
Josh's categorization can then be used to organize the many ways crowdsourcing can be applied to creating value.

Creation

Ideagora:

Literally a marketplace for ideas. Ideagoras function as extended staff to an organization. When an organization encounters a problem that can not be addressed by internal staff, because of time constraints or talent, the ideagora serves as an open call to qualified people who can solve the problem. Typically ideagoras consist of detailed problem statement, a reward for solving the problem, and in some cases an area for people to exchange information or team up to collaboratively solve the problem.

Prediction

Decision Market