What's Mine Is Yours: The Rise of Collaborative Consumption

in the twentieth century of hyper-consumption we were defined by credit, advertising, and what we owned; in the twenty-first century of Collaborative Consumption we will be defined by reputation, by community, and by what we can access and how we share and what we give away.13

For the most part, the people and places are not vetted, inspected, or interviewed by Airbnb. It’s up to users to determine if they want to host a guest or if they want to stay with someone based on kaleidoscopic photos of the property, detailed profiles, and other users’ reviews.

question,” Fenton explains. The founders came up with different open-ended questions that anyone could answer but that would also prompt people to share something deeper about themselves. “Where did you grow up?” or “What are some of the most interesting things you have seen or done in your life?” These were questions that hosts and travelers could

We are turning products into services, even if we’re not conscious of it.

collaborative service systems vary across the different levels of effort required to participate in them. Systems that require more effort require more willpower, whereas systems that require less effort require less willpower.

The trend experts call this dynamic “transumerism” and attribute its emergence to living in a consumer world with so many choices. The consumer culture of the last century has left us with a deep desire for choice. Product service systems can cater to the desire for “just one more” but without the creation of waste. The “what do we feel like today”

book—critical mass, idling capacity, belief in the commons, and trust between strangers. Collaborative Consumption is not a niche trend, and it’s not a reactionary blip to the 2008 global financial crisis. It’s a growing movement with millions of people participating from all corners of the world.

“access is better than ownership.”

we also spend inordinate amounts of energy and money storing excess stuff rather than asking the hard truths of why we have so much in the first place.