The theme of etech is Remix: the notion that there's all this stuff out there (data, services, applications, even physical products like Tivo) that people are taking and remixing, creating something new, possibly useful, certainly interesting derivations. Much of the content industry is aghast at this sort of thing, the RIAA being the classic example in going after mash-up DJs like The Kleptones or Beatallica. This week's The Economist has an article fortunately timed to this conference: Economist.com | The future of innovation The rise of the creative consumer. How and why smart companies are harnessing the creativity of their customers:

How does innovation happen? The familiar story involves boffins in academic institutes and R&D labs. But lately, corporate practice has begun to challenge this old-fashioned notion. Open-source software development is already well-known. Less so is the fact that Bell, an American bicycle-helmet maker, has collected hundreds of ideas for new products from its customers, and is putting several of them into production. Or that Electronic Arts (EA), a maker of computer games, ships programming tools to its customers, posts their modifications online and works their creations into new games. And so on. Not only is the customer king: now he is market-research head, R&D chief and product-development manager, too.

At the heart of most thinking about innovation is the belief that people expect to be paid for their creative work: hence the need to protect and reward the creation of intellectual property. One really exciting thing about user-led innovation is that customers seem willing to donate their creativity freely, says Mr Von Hippel. This may be because it is their only practical option: patents are costly to get and often provide only weak protection. Some people may value the enhanced reputation and network effects of freely revealing their work more than any money they could make by patenting it. Either way, some firms are starting to believe that there really is such a thing as a free lunch.