Cottoning on

O.K., so from links like this and other things that turn up when you Google "prestige economy", I have come to realize that I am not exactly the first person ever online to talk economically about intellectual property and prestige. In fact, for all I know this bender was triggered by recovered memory. But I'm adding value, I know I am. I'll prove it to you too (you hypothetical one or two who can stand reading a post of mine all the way to the end), once I'm a little better read. Off the bat, I'd say what I'm talking about is bigger. Way bigger. Also more mechanistic and explanatory. A lot of the gift-culture and prestige stuff that's been written in the context of open source software and the Web in general seems to be in the vein of "hey, we could just have it be like those guys over there," without explaining where it's coming from, why it works or why we might expect it to work over here, let alone more broadly. Incidentally, I'd sure love to have some comments and/or discussion on this stuff.

Anybody who's a bona fide scholar in any area pertaining to that on which I am spouting should feel free to comment anonymously or under pseudonym, if he or she fears a taint of association with such vulgar dilettantism as I am engaged in here. It doesn't 100% guarantee you anonymity from me I suppose, since my site meter sometimes tells me the institution that people are browsing from and often I peek. But I'm nobody's academic colleague and in no position to deny anybody tenure or a position. I'm recalcitrant, but I am most eminently to be trifled with.