Electronic Potlatch: A Study on New Technologies and Primitive Economic Behaviors

Description

Economy - the very idea. In an age where the market economy seems to have achieved a total and omnipresent hegemony, there would seem to be little to discuss anymore. Going against this, the book argues for a sensitivity to other forms of economies,and the hybrids existing in our postindustrial society.Concentrating specifically on gift economies, and presenting a very vibrant and alive version of such an economy existing today, the book tries to widen the perspective of what economy is, and at the same time present a case for a 'new primitivism' in the study of such.Based on an ethnographic study of 'warez' and the community around these, the book analyzes competitive giving and what happens in networked economies where normal economic restrictions no longer apply. In this sense it is a study of economy in a general sense, although thoroughly studied in a very particular case.