Monday, December 15, 2008

Re: A Thousand Tomorrows: kashklash or the future of value

kashklash or the future of value

kashklashWe could have easily called this post the future of money, yet in a more profound sense the current financial climate and the questions it is raising are provoking us to rethink value and the systems we devise to organize processes related to it.

Heather Moore, User Experience Manager at Vodafone, recently launched the lovely public domain initiative KashKlash aimed at an open discussion to co-create our future value systems. The sharing economy, the reputation economy, the gift economy, the free economy, alternative economies, shifting balances between production and consumption, ways to replace money, etc. are all themes up for debate over at the website.

“We are envisioning a new world where today’s aging, less useful and even dangerous financial systems are replaced by or mixed with more disruptive innovations and exchanges. Imagine yourself deprived of all of today’s financial resources. Maybe you’re a refugee or stateless. Yet you still have your handset and laptop and Internet and a broadband cellphone connection….”

Bruce Sterling proposes to explore 4 future scenarios, set up around 2 key variables: the degree of stability in exchange systems (ranging from a ‘confusing mess’ to ‘massive change’) & the state of communication technology (ranging from ‘old and broken’ to ‘the new cloud’).

Check out the stories of the scenarios’ main characters Big Mama, Greifswald, Rebel kids and Brixels.