On Wed, 9 Dec 2015 20:54:10 +0000 Zenaan Harkness <zen@freedbms.net> wrote:
Perhaps this is worth discussion.
Are AirBnB, Uber and Homejoy examples of political anarchism (degenerate or otherwise)?
AiBnB and Uber are centralized middlemen - though the fact that uber goes against the privileges of the taxi mafia is an example of a freer market at work - at least in some limited fashion. On the other hand the 'market' is wholly owned by the middleman and the potential for abuse (assuming airbnb is not already the NSA) is...big. I suppose the anarchist version would exist as a p2p network, for starters. Haven't the cypherpunks already coded a bunch of those decentralized, censorship resistant, anonymous, bla bla bla systems? Anyway, I think couchsurfing is closer to anarchism than uber or airbnb (though the platform is just as centralized).
Are we seeing the ultimate in self responsibility (I would say self responsibility is a good thing)?
How might we embrace such self responsibility, whilst also manifesting collective empathy/ shared 'responsibility' (perhaps there's a better term here)?
Is Lauren Weinstein with his indenting style actually Juan in disguise?
Well...this is something I wouldn't say : " companies are stripping away worker protections, pushing down wages, and flouting government regulations" While I do think that airbnb and the like are more sophisticated forms of corporatism (not a free market), I wouldn't suggest that they are the only bad guys in town and that 'progressive' statists are the good guys who protect 'workers' with 'regulations'.
Or is it in actual fact the other way around? Z
---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: "PFIR (People For Internet Responsibility) Announcement List" <pfir@pfir.org> Date: Wed, 9 Dec 2015 09:48:40 -0800 Subject: [ PFIR ] The "Sharing Economy" Is the Problem To: pfir-list@pfir.org
The "Sharing Economy" Is the Problem
http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/33720-the-sharing-economy-is-the-probl...
It's unfortunate then that these companies and the misnamed "sharing economy" are really just fronts for millionaires and billionaires to opportunistically ride off the backs of everyday people, while also exacerbating many economic inequalities. Avi Asher-Schapiro explains the truth in Jacobin: The premise is seductive in its simplicity: people have skills, and customers want services. Silicon Valley plays matchmaker, churning out apps that pair workers with work. Now, anyone can rent out an apartment with AirBnB, become a cabbie through Uber, or clean houses using Homejoy. But under the guise of innovation and progress, companies are stripping away worker protections, pushing down wages, and flouting government regulations. At its core, the sharing economy is a scheme to shift risk from companies to workers, discourage labor organizing, and ensure that capitalists can reap huge profits with low fixed costs.