Prosumers

I thought of this word on my own, only to find it's already been made up. Wikipedia tells me it is ". . . a person who consumes and produces media." Oh well. There's nothing new under the sun, right? What I wanted to mean by this is that any given person can be both a producer and a consumer. We speak of customers, employees, etc. I don't think it is useful to distinguish these roles. Really, we are all just trading things of value. There are only traders. On one side of the trade might be a group of individuals working together to deliver their thing of value (e.g. a "company"). On the other side might be an individual, using a proxy for an actual thing of value. Dollars, for example, are proxies, representing something of value a person has contributed to producing for someone else. I.e. they got money for being producers. So, it is really like two producers trading. Why do I think it is useful to think in these terms? Well, for one, it always seems to me better to think in terms of reality, when trying to figure out real-world issues. Money is just a medium --IOU's in the form of tokens--, humans made up (which does have use). -not an actual thing of value. The names we give the parties, in this trade are also made up by humans. They don't describe a real, fundamental, difference in the nature of the people in the two parties. For two, though, it allows us to not try to impose certain rules which apply to only one side, but not the other. If one side is working in a group (e.g. a "company") to deliver their thing of value, in this trade, why can't the other side do the same? So we have "companies", "labor unions", "consumer unions". Aren't they, fundamentally, all the same thing? --groups of people trying to optimize some aspect(s) on their side of the trade? Currency obscures this, by being a proxy for trades which happened in the past (and thus we don't see them now). But we're all just trading things of value, we can deliver. So I think of our "new" economy, with things like Uber, AirB&B, Postmates, etc. Uber is NOT providing rides for people. They are centralizing the information to connect people who want rides, with those willing/able to give them. I recently saw a piece (on PBS?) about Postmates. It is like an Uber, for mail and package delivery. But the two drivers profiled said they would not do it full-time, if they had other options. -sounds like they weren't getting paid enough, in relation to their true costs, and weren't able to turn down individual assignments. But if the drivers/couriers were able to unionize, etc., that could make it a better trade for them. It seems like the policies/design of Postmates has skewed the trade in terms of one group, over the other. It's easier for Postmates to extract their cut from the "customer" group, in this trade, simply because they are using proxy value (currency). So, even though it is just a trade going on, the "customer" group effectively has more control over Postmates, because it is like they are paying for the service. If Postmates, and other services, don't try to treat both sides equally, they're going to end up not having enough conscientious people working for them. This shift in thinking makes a big difference. If you are mediating a transaction, but you, effectively advocate more for one party, you are going to raise transaction costs, due to mistrust, and turn people off of using your service. So what are some ways a company like Postmates can be more fair? Of course they could allow couriers to invest and profit-share. But that could then skew things in favor of the couriers. If a mediation service like this is a publicly traded company, both deliverers and senders have the option to "profit-share" by buying stock, anyway. Here's another way they might be able to even things. -if couriers could rate senders (and refuse to take certain jobs), as well as vice versa. I don't know. It reminds me of eBay. If you get bad service, or a bad product, from a seller you can give a bad rating. But then they can turn around and give you a bad rating, just because you did. The assumption seems to be that the buyer leaves feedback first. That seems skewed towards sellers. But if I think of it more in terms of a trade, between two equal parties, the answer seems more obvious: You leave feedback  when you receive your part of the trade, and only about what/how you received it. The seller leaves feedback when they get their money. The buyer leaves feedback when they get their item. Maybe no one should see the other's feedback, until they leave their own (maybe within a certain time period, after the transaction). I don't know. But it seems like solutions become a little clearer when we think of things like the trades they really are, rather than labeling one as a giver, and the other as a receiver, or something like that.