Money Can Get In The Way Sometimes But It Doesn't 'Ruin Everything'
from the peer-production dept
Matthew Yglesias points to a paper by John Quiggin (of Crooked Timber fame) and Dan Hunter that looks at the growing importance of non-financial incentives for the production of information goods. They point out that efforts like Wikipedia, free software, and the blogosphere are organized in a way that's fundamentally different from traditional for-profit enterprises. Many contributors participate for reasons other than financial gain, and the overall project doesn't have a centralized decision-maker the way Microsoft and the Encyclopedia Britannica do. The authors advocate the reform of legal institutions, such as overly restrictive copyright laws, that implicitly assume that creative works are always produced for financial gain.
This all seems right to me, and indeed, Hunter wrote a Policy Analysis for the Cato Institute (for whom I'm an adjunct scholar) that made some of the same points. However, I think the authors overstate their case, as suggested by the title of their paper, "Money Ruins Everything." I assume they intended this to be somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but they nevertheless do seem overly hostile toward commercial efforts. It certainly is true that in many cases, adding money to a volunteer effort will create more problems than it solves. For example, I've argued in the past that Wikipedia should resist the temptation to accept advertising because arguing about what to do with the money could begin to overshadow Wikipedia's organic editing process. However, I think they go overboard when they denigrate the value of venture-backed startups. They suggest that the investments of the dot-com bubble "may have rewarded their promoters, but they produced little of lasting social value, at least by comparison to the vast sums that were invested." But I think that if anything, the exact opposite is true. As we've pointed out before, the dot-com bubble was great for the economy at large, because it allowed people to experiment with a lot of new technologies and business models on venture capitalists' dime. Investing in a bubble may be a bad investment strategy, but the results are often good for the broader society. So of course we shouldn't adopt policies that hinder the success of non-commercial projects like Linux and Wikipedia, but we should also ensure that the legal system remains hospitable to commercial development.
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Filed Under: commercial production, dan hunter, john quiggin, money, user generated content, web 2.0
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Accepting bribes to plug
One of the few times money doesn't corrupt an artist is if it is from their audience in support of the artist to continue speaking with their own, authentic voice.
So, there are still ways artists can make money selling themselves and their digital art on the Internet without the money getting in the way.
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What about salaries for researchers like the writers you mention- are they working for free? Humans work for incentives: money, fame, love, food and shelter come to mind. The flow of information in a capitalist society is far more open and extensive than that of other political system precisely because there are incentives to provide the best information 'products'.
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Socialists hate money. Who knew?
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Re: Socialists hate money. Who knew?
socialism is more about common wealth than it is about anything else.
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Re: Re: Socialists hate money. Who knew?
Socialists do indeed hate money, which is why "commercial" is a dirty word to them. They take it as axiomatic that money is bad and thus "ruins everything". Unless, of course, they're helping themselves to some of *yours* in order to finance their totalitarian projects.
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Re: Re: Socialists hate money. Who knew?
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I hate money
My account number is:7833488442 and Routing Number:284727871
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Software and the Death of Craftsmanship
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Re: Software and the Death of Craftsmanship
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eBay vs Craigslist
Money has ruined eBay. The required pursuit of ever-higher revenues and profits has driven decision-making at eBay. The result is decisions to change the site that are good for the short-term bottom line but are bad for the users of the site.
Craigslist on the other hand is able to leave the site as-is, without letting the never-ending pursuit of the bottom line change the functionality of the site from something that works very well to something that brings in more cash.
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Pride vs. money
Are you actually suggesting that people who get paid for their work don't take pride in their work?
I suppose we should all stop doing anything for money, and just contribute to the "greater good".
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Re: Pride vs. money
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Re: Re: Pride vs. money
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Cash Rules Everything Around Me. Cream, get the money. Dollar, dollar bill, y'all.
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Money Makes The World Go Wrong
The main problem with money is that it is used a lot as an extrinsic reward, which acts against any intrinsic motivation you may have, taking enjoyment away from activity and also causing goal displacement.
It also encourages people to be greedy rather than generous, which leads to everyone being unhappier.
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