To browse Academia. The Zero Marginal Cost Society explores the transition from traditional market capitalism to a new economic paradigm, the Collaborative Commons. It discusses how the two systems coexist and influence each other, highlighting the rise of collaborative economic practices such as cooperatives and social enterprises.
The book presents evidence of significant shifts in consumer behavior and technological advancements that are reshaping modern economies. This article investigates the potential role of the commons in the future transformation of digital capitalism by comparing it to the role of the commons in the transition to capitalism.
In medieval and early modern Europe the commons supported gradual social and technological innovation as well as a new civil society organized around the combination of commons-based petty production and new ideals of freedom and equality. Today the new commons generated by the global real subsumption of ordinary life processes are supporting similar forms of commons-based petty production.
After positioning the new petty producers within the framework of the crisis of digital capitalism, the article concludes by extrapolating a number of hypothetical scenarios for their role in its future transformation.
This book explores the potential creation of a broader collaborative economy through commons-based peer production P2P and the emergent role of information and communication technologies ICTs. The book seeks to critically engage in the political discussion of commons-based peer production, which can be classified into three basic arguments: the liberal, the reformist and the anti-capitalist.
