OSCON 2012: Tim O'Reilly, "The Clothesline Paradox and the Sharing Economy"

Open source software was one of the earliest successful examples of a sharing economy that has had huge economic impact. But as alternative energy advocate Steve Baer once noted, ecosystem services are often ignored in economic analysis: when you put your clothes in the dryer, the energy you use is measured and counted, but when you hang them on the line, they disappear from the measured economy. In this talk, I explore how various sharing economies are directly and indirectly monetized, and ruminate on their future.

Tim O'Reilly

O'Reilly Media, Inc.

Tim O'Reilly is the founder and CEO of O'Reilly Media, Inc., thought by many to be the best computer book publisher in the world. O'Reilly Media also hosts conferences on technology topics, including the O'Reilly Open Source Convention, the Web 2.0 Summit, Strata: The Business of Data, and many others. O'Reilly's Make: magazine and Maker Faire has been compared to the West Coast Computer Faire, which launched the personal computer revolution. Tim's blog, O'Reilly Radar, "watches the alpha geeks" to determine emerging technology trends, and serves as a platform for advocacy about issues of importance to the technical community. Tim is also a partner at O'Reilly AlphaTech Ventures, O'Reilly's early stage venture firm, and is on the board of Safari Books Online.

• Category

  Science & Technology

[AlexDeese]

DFTBA? ;)

[mazetechsystems]

I agree, but I think the point is that they need to have a similar infrastructure for cable tv content. So when you pay similar amounts of money for cable tv as for internet and for when paying for cable TV much of you money goes to the content providers, on the internet no money goes to the content providers

[Noel Moes]

I agree with Kevin Shockey here - I may win my argument by watching something else - HEY I AGREE THAT SOMETHING ELSE IS ENTIRELY TRUMPING HIS CLOTHESLINE ARGUMENT :.(

[vic button]

The only answer is to make our money system obsolete and change to a gift economy.

[smrki1]

Thanks to Tim O'Reilly, I am reading Les Miserables by Victor Hugo. Indeed a great book.

[Kevin Shockey]

For me, all signs are pointing to the content industry having to redefine what is value? How does an author give more value than they collect? A film maker? A musician? If those questions don't make any sense, then how does a publisher give more value than they collect? A movie studio? A music label? What are their gifts?

[roidroid]

What he said about popstars was amazing. They make more money on youtube than itunes, and half of it is from people embedding their music into their own personal videos.

I guess all of that money comes from the ad revenue played on those videos, right?

[Yasmani Llanes]

As far as the ISP's goes, he needs to remember that there are servers to maintain, networks to support, routers to manage, all done by the ISP's. So in reality, we pay for those services. The guy needs a course of networking 101.

[Daniel Catalano]

great grat lecture!