[p2p-research] A Penny for your P2P Thoughts

[Ryan Lanham]

*Should a P2P devotee take money for a contribution to the commons?*

Let's imagine a commons was somehow endowed...like a university.  Could it
be appropriate for the commons to pay for open contributions or is the very
idea of "open" simply outside the concept of getting some dosh for day's
drollery?

I say take the buck, and perhaps even spend the buck--why shouldn't
wikipedia pay a great physicist for an article?  It is perfectly fine to be
paid for work and there is no crisis in calling something P2P if it has a
bit of the old modes attached.

One thinks of property trusts for real estate as a possible analogy.
Wouldn't it be nice in the post-life estates of certain academics or artists
if they gave their portfolio of intellectual properties to an open trust as
a P2P "gift?"  Surely it has already happened...perhaps many times.  And if
it is OK to die and pass something into a commons, why not have it be OK to
live and sell something to a commons?  Who loses?

Imagine that quaint New England town that surrounded the common grazing
grounds with houses.  Would it be so wrong if they paid the fellow living
next door for a little expansion turf?  Of course not.

People get edgy about markets--pro and con.  They get religious.  P2P ought
not to be of any given creed with regard to markets.  What P2P ought to be
is open, about responsibility and sharing, and interested in general
advancement.  It is about growing an open access commons for
non-hierarchical interactions and uses.  How it gets to these ends can be a
manifold story.


Ryan
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