What's Mine Is Yours: The Rise of Collaborative Consumption by Botsman Rachel & Rogers Roo

Author:Botsman, Rachel & Rogers, Roo [Rogers, Roo]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: Harper Collins, Inc.
Published: 2010-09-13T22:00:00+00:00

I’ll Help You, Someone Else Helps Me

Anthropologists and socioeconomists have spent decades examining the principle of people responding to a positive action with another positive action, referred to as “direct reciprocity.” The roots of the term are indeed re and pro, meaning back and forth, to and fro between people.9 The well-known phrase “You scratch my back, and I’ll scratch yours” might sound cynical; another, “Do unto others as they do unto you,” sounds more idealistic—but both capture the belief that humans have an innate propensity to reciprocate. We understand that it is in our long-term self-interest to do so. Robert Cialdini explains, “The rule for reciprocation allows one individual to give something to another with confidence that it is not being lost. This sense of future obligation within the rule makes possible the development of various kinds of continuing relationships, transactions, and exchanges that are beneficial to the society.”10 It’s easy to see how cooperation worked in times when transactions took place between relatives, neighbors, or members of the same small village, when the exchange was face-to-face, and when people could easily keep track of their interactions. But what happens in communities where the giving and taking are happening between people who don’t know one another and who are geographically dispersed?

In social networks, the reciprocation becomes indirect (indirect reciprocity). No longer is it based on the simple premise “I’ll help you, if you help me.”11 Now the cooperative dynamic becomes “I’ll help you, someone else helps me.” During the final stages of writing this book, Rachel’s Twitter account was hacked. In the middle of the night, thousands of spam messages were sent to her followers saying “hey. I lost weight and FEEL great . . . I did it with Free acai berry from here: http://z8.ro/4e2” When she woke up and opened her e-mail she had e-mails from more than twenty-five people from her Twitter following. “Rachel, if no one’s alerted you, thought I’d let you know I suspect your Twitter was hacked. . . .” and “You usually post useful links and insights but I just received a weird DM (direct message) about ‘acai berry’ diets. I think you have been hacked.” When Rachel contacted Twitter, she was amazed to discover that several people from her Twitter community had already alerted Twitter about the problem and it had been fixed, all whilst she had been asleep. When she was asked to fill out a report form to help prevent others from getting hacked in the future, Twitter framed the request as “sharing is caring.” Nowadays if Rachel sees that one of the people she follows has been hacked, she is motivated to return the favor by sending the person a message and contacting Twitter, even if it is not one of the same people who directly helped her.

A culture of “indirect reciprocity” is often referred to as the “gift economy,” one where people give goods and services without any explicit agreement for immediate or future reward.12 This model is at work in Freecycle.

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