In October 2010, Latitude Research and Shareable Magazine published the results of an open study called The New Sharing Economy. (Full disclosure: I head up content at Latitude, and I led this particular study.) The study was the first of its kind—investigating the rise of shared services like Netflix and Zipcar, or a trend called "Collaborative Consumption," as coined by Rachel Botsman, co-author of What's Mine is Yours: The Rise of Collaborative Consumption.
The study looked at current attitudes and behaviors around how people share now, and how (or what) they'd like to be sharing more in the future.
Infographic by Latitude, (cc) some rights reserved.
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The top 5 opportunity spaces for sharing were determined to be:
- Time
- Household goods
- Automobiles
- Living space
- Money
Wait. More people wanted to share time than money? "I believe marketplaces that use network technologies to enable the exchange of less tangible assets such as time, space and skills are going to be huge," Rachel Botsman told Latitude at the time. "It is part of a massive redefinition of values and what has value and realizing that we can fulfill our wants and needs with other assets beyond colored paper notes that we call money."
The more you think about it, the more it makes sense. A large number of study participants suggested new services that might be local timebanks like the Bay Area Community Exchange or other infrastructures that would help them barter skills with their neighbors, cutting traditional currency right out of the equation. We at Swaptitude thought you could apply this model to a community that's more decentralized—but also more naturally cohesive—than many neighborhoods right now: developers, designers, writers, marketers, photographers & videographers—essentially, people who make the Internet.
We think this is a particularly interesting space because there's more to exchange than time and utility. There's elements of reputation, creativity, connectedness and real collaboration to be brought to light.
