Conceptually you could also apply this to work, once we 'owned' our livelihood - as farmers, millers, carpenters, ranchers - now most people 'access' work through huge corporations. This makes people vulnerable to the whims of invisible Boards who can force compliance to ideologies on others. Does the same concept apply or am I stretching?
Love this, John. It seems like this is the same line of thinking that drives much of the Crypto currency movement too (i.e., breaking away from the central dependency/middleman of the banking system). Just a little thought that came to my mind from some of the terminology you used in this article.
As someone who works in a library, this hits close to home. The access vs. ownership debate that John highlights is an existential threat to educational nonprofits. The average college library's greatest expense is now "renting" access to online content which the library can never truly own. Would recommend reading Brewster Kahle's article "I Set Out to Build The Next Library of Alexandria. Now I Wonder: Will There Be Libraries in 25 Years?" about the challenges facing libraries in an era of "online access." https://time.com/6108581/internet-archive-future-books/
Really interesting facet on this topic, Dan! I wasn't aware of the fact that you're bringing up regarding "renting" access...pretty scary when you realize just how quickly access is the becoming a sort of corporate control of "the means of production" et al.
Conceptually you could also apply this to work, once we 'owned' our livelihood - as farmers, millers, carpenters, ranchers - now most people 'access' work through huge corporations. This makes people vulnerable to the whims of invisible Boards who can force compliance to ideologies on others. Does the same concept apply or am I stretching?
That’s actually fascinating. I’ve thought of a lot of areas where it occurs but not work. I think that totally applies
Love this, John. It seems like this is the same line of thinking that drives much of the Crypto currency movement too (i.e., breaking away from the central dependency/middleman of the banking system). Just a little thought that came to my mind from some of the terminology you used in this article.
Intriguing. I’m honestly rather unversed in the world of crypto but I think that makes sense
I'm not going to pretend to be well versed in it either, but from what I do know of it it seems to run along a similar vein of thinking.
Thanks, John. Good thoughts for young and old.
As someone who works in a library, this hits close to home. The access vs. ownership debate that John highlights is an existential threat to educational nonprofits. The average college library's greatest expense is now "renting" access to online content which the library can never truly own. Would recommend reading Brewster Kahle's article "I Set Out to Build The Next Library of Alexandria. Now I Wonder: Will There Be Libraries in 25 Years?" about the challenges facing libraries in an era of "online access." https://time.com/6108581/internet-archive-future-books/
Daniel, yes I can totally see the correlation in the library world. Thank you for sharing that article, I will definitely give it a read!
Really interesting facet on this topic, Dan! I wasn't aware of the fact that you're bringing up regarding "renting" access...pretty scary when you realize just how quickly access is the becoming a sort of corporate control of "the means of production" et al.
Such a great point that we need to tread carefully with a lot of discernment and discipline.