The self-publishing phenomenon demonstrates that people crave an audience for their opinions. Practically everyone wants to be heard by anyone who will listen – more of a Celebrity Society than one of Contribution. Our written opinions are our valuable “contributions” if only in our minds.

When the Total Cost of Contribution (used in jest) is low, our willingness to “contribute” is off the charts.

Now try to think of examples where the Total Cost of Contribution is much higher (i.e. requires substantially more effort on our part). The spike in volunteerism following natural disasters aside, how many people are willing to make regular contributions outside the boundaries of their homes and cubicles? Relatively few by any measure.

I should also point out that open source software and most of the “contributions” in the blogosphere are possible because the contributors’ have other sources for income, sustainability and sustenance. However, if the cost of contribution goes up and they perceive a negative impact on their day-to-day lives, their participation in such activities typically goes down. The enormous number of abandoned open source projects, blogs and websites is the most obvious illustration of the effects of TCC on social contribution.

I admire your worldview and even agree with some of it. My intent is not to minimize the wonderful work of those who continue to commit themselves to making contributions that make this world a better place. I only wish to challenge the notion of a Contribution Society and push everyone to be more critical of the types of contributions they make, and their motivations.

That thought that we just numbed ourselves with TV for the past 4 decades got me thinking about how that really was the basis for consumer culture. So I’ve been using the term “producer culture” in much the same way you’re talking about Contribution Society.

Couper les cheveaux en quatre? Bien sur.

I jumped over here from slacktivist. Basically, I agree with you; while copyright, patent, trademark and similar “intellectual property” laws were originally designed to protect individual contributions to society, they have been coopted as ways to steal from genuinely creative folks in the name of profit. In many cases today, the people who actually created the works cannot do what they want because some corporation owns part or all of the copyright.

The new edition of Utne talks about this in depth, especially in relation to how South American govts and artists are trying to buck the corporate tide by using more shareware, “commons” licenses, etc.

Bob, what you say is true in theory. There are certainly quite a few ethical wealthy people who DO make great contributions to society, but in practice a lot of wealth sits in the hands of people who got their money by taking from society, by manipulating people, and by playing what amount to legal shell games. To them, what they own is simply a tool for amassing greater wealth and power, not one for giving back to the community that made their wealth possible. Although sometimes they do give to other people, their intent is anything but generous.