January 29, 2009
Access is the new hotness
In other words, access of goods trumps ownership:
As creations become digital they tend to become shared, ownerless goods. We can turn this around and say that in this realm of bits, property itself becomes a more social endeavor. Property may be less about title and more about usage and control. An idea can’t be owned in the way gold can; in fact an idea has little value unless it is shared or used to some extent. Its value paradoxically can increase the less it is owned privately. But if no one owns it, who gains the benefit of that increase in value? In the new regime users will often assume many of the chores that owners once had to do. And so in a way, usage becomes ownership.
According to the principle of dematerialization, all goods are having their atoms infused with bits, decreasing their weight per performance, so that all material goods increasingly behave as if they were intangible services. This means that lumber, steel, chemicals, food, cars, plane flights – everything made – can also be governed by the principles of intangible goods (see the New Rules of the New Economy). As goods become disembodied, infused with slivers of mind, and packed full of bits, they will also obey the new dynamics of property. Soon enough everything manufactured will potentially become social property.
As cars become more “electronic” or digital, they will tend to be swapped and shared and used in a social way. The more we embed intelligence and smarts into clothing the more we’ll treat these articles as common property. We’ll share aspects of them (perhaps what they are made of, where they are, what climate they see), which means that we’ll think of ourselves as sharing them.
While there is obvious truth to the article, the opposite truth from “the principle of dematerialization” will also emerge: namely, ownership will take no greater value since the majority of consumables will effectively rented. Further, the item owned will require greater customability and quality (Kevin Kelly admits as much) than its rentable contemporaries. In specific terms, print media is dying unless you mean nicely crafted, beautiful bound books. We’ll see plenty of those popping up.
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