At the same time, it is also true that mainstream media has barely touched this story, aside from the occasional article in the Wall Street Journal or New York Times, so who knows how widely understood the situation actually is. Certainly, it is in the interest of media companies to keep concern low, since targeted ads bring them higher rates at a time when their traditional business model is melting down. But it is sadly predictable that abuses will occur without appropriate oversight, just as they did recently in the housing market and on Wall Street, to disastrous effect.
You can expect that soon profiles about you will be compiled with an expansiveness and efficiency that would have made the East German secret service green with envy. How will that information be used? Will that profile be reviewed by an employer to discover if you take part in “questionable” behavior, or will a landlord check into your “desirability” before you sign a new lease? If they can, while reducing financial risk and reassuring investors, it’s hard to believe they would resist.
Meanwhile, the ads that get pumped out through this targeting system are unchanged, as annoying and manipulative as ever. And as the number of ad messages we receive grows, the attention that any one attracts drops. Madison Avenue has been complaining for years about how hard it is to cut through the clutter in this crowded environment, that it forces them to push out more and more ads if they hope to have an impact and get precious clicks. But why should you click? Ads swarm around us like gnats, asking to be swatted away. Your first impulse is to not click, because you know ads can’t be trusted. The average click-through rate for an online ad is a fraction of 1 percent; a response by more than 2 percent is considered a phenomenal success. Think about it: over 98 percent of viewers prefer to not respond to the interactive ads they see.
But instead of bending matchmaking technology to the purposes of the old marketing paradigm, emerging technologies could support a different model, one that respects our privacy, acknowledges our intelligence, and responds to actual needs, not manufactured desires. Imagine how different things would be if marketing messages had integrity, if their claims were vetted by trusted sources, and if they informed you about things you really want, so you could evaluate whether a product is right for you. Instead of being on the receiving end of an endless stream of crafty seductions that hope to trigger a purchase, you would be exposed to just a few that are clear and informative, and only for products that you deliberately express an interest in. An ad’s claims would be validated by independent third parties, like Consumer Reports, and these ratings would be easy to find, even if they are less than favorable.
You’re probably thinking: forget it, that’s impossible. And, of course, you’re probably right. But before you dismiss this prospect entirely, please join me for a thought experiment. Suppose that:
Instead of an anonymous corporation owning your personal data, and deciding what to do with it without your permission, you control the data in your digital profile. You choose to “track yourself” as you go from place to place online, collecting the geologs from your mobile phone, your social network links, your current address and other relevant data in your profile. With this control, you get to decide what information is in your digital profile, what information can be shared with whom and under what conditions. This is not a pipe dream; companies are appearing that can provide these services. For instance, as this book goes to press, a new class of services is emerging that offers data banking to consumers; just as your money is not made invalid when you move it from one bank to another, your data can be portable in the same way between service providers. Companies such as Mydex, Azigo, Personal.com and Singly are offering the first wave of digital data banking services of this kind, and are an encouraging sign of things to come.
Instead of being on the receiving end of a relentless stream of unwelcome ads, you use your digital profile to express interests and needs, soliciting information about the product categories that matter to you. Rather than being solicited by marketing companies who push out ads based on their best guesses about what you might respond to, you only view the marketing messages you request. It is well known that pursuing “qualified leads” of this kind is a far more effective way to reach a customer than today’s buckshot model.
Instead of producing ads that compete for your attention by making cheesy come-ons or questionable claims—while communicating next to nothing that can be trusted—advertisers agree to follow a code of conduct. Promotional claims are validated by independent third parties. Today, there are scores of certification systems that evaluate claims about product safety, greenness, organic materials, localism, and fair labor practices. Twenty-first-century Green Seal stamps would be printed on every package and be a click away from any ad banner. Product information becomes easily available and transparent—not because the government compels it, but because the absence of third-party certification signals consumers not to buy a product.
Instead of staring blankly at a new product, unable to learn whether friends and others you trust have tried and liked it, you have access to a list of people you know that says whether they give the product a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down.” Every product, of course, has mixed reviews. But you can easily find the percentage of people whose shopping prowess you trust that have endorsed a particular product—not because they get paid for it, but because they want you to support the best green cleanser, the best locally built furniture, the most effective water-saving washing machine. Again, this information is managed through your user-centric digital profile.
Instead of pushing sales messages onto an unsuspecting public, marketing companies act as brokers that work on behalf of both the producer and the consumer, bringing the two into contact. If you are in the market for a new rug, for instance, your interest is broadcast to floor cover marketing companies, which respond with information about their clients. Based on your desired price point, material of choice, and design type, the marketers target the messages they send to you. Because they have agreed to follow a code of conduct, the ads are substantive instead of gimmicky. Clicking on the banner brings you to a web page that conveys what you need to know about the product, along with a video and a list of stores near you that stock it. The best marketers are known for the effectiveness of their matchmaking capabilities in a trusted environment.
This approach would fundamentally alter the way we shop. The difference was made clear to me by Kaliya Hamlin, organizer of the semi-annual Internet Identity Workshop conferences in the Bay Area, and one of the leading analysts of digital identity trends. The current model, she explained, can be shown in a simple diagram with three nodes (see figure 1): the buyer, the producer, and the marketer—which is the sole intermediary between the other two, sending messages to potential buyers with little to no idea who the buyers are, hoping to convert a sale. Note that the communication from the marketer to the buyer is in one direction, with the buyer at the receiving end, unable to respond or participate in any kind of dialogue. In many instances, the marketer is supported by services that provide digital dossiers on millions of people that help them to target customers. For instance, Experian proudly boasts that it has detailed profiles of 2.1 billion people which it offers for sale to support targeted web advertising.
Figure 1.
The alternative model, made possible by digital identity technology, introduces two new intermediaries between the buyer and the producer (see figure 2). One is the buyer’s agent, which represents the interest of the buyer and broadcasts the message that the buyer is looking for a particular product—such as a dark blue organic wool rug that is six by nine feet. This agent is the trusted broker of the buyer’s personal data (its “data banker”), and it only shares this information under the buyer’s direction. The second new intermediary is the producer’s agent, which broadcasts information about the producer’s products to buyers’ agents across the internet, looking for matches. This product information would be detailed and vetted by third parties, and should includ
e the product’s environmental impact, labor conditions, consumer evaluations, and more. So before the buyer makes a decision about whether or not to purchase that rug, she knows how it was manufactured, the materials that went into it, and what other people think about it. The key to this model is that the buyer’s agent is aware of the buyer’s personal data, and the producer’s agent is not. A fully functioning market like this eliminates the need for services that sell digital dossiers to marketers, such as Experian. The transactions could take place online, but just as likely, the producer’s agent could draw potential buyers to come by brick-and-mortar retail outlets to experience the products in person.
Figure 2.
You can see how a system like this could grow to include all of the essential products you use, from toilet paper and face cream to clothing and hardware. The technology exists today to turn our marketing paradigm upside down—or, perhaps more accurately, right side up. The key innovation is for digital profile data to move easily from place to place online, under the control and ownership of the person it is about. Over the past few years, a number of components of this potential new systems have emerged from forums like the Internet Identity Workshop, OASIS, W3C and the World Economic Forum Rethinking Personal Data project. The core of these systems are built by privacy activists to keep governments and corporations from holding information about you without permission. The challenge to this twenty-first-century marketing paradigm is not technical. Rather, it is social. As a society, are we ready to apply existing technology to transform how we exchange goods?
Once products are connected to people’s actual needs, the entire thrust of messages that marketers send would change. No more need for misleading claims. The tenor of advertising would shift to propositions coming from a place of integrity. At the same time, the rationale for wasteful, flashy packaging is eliminated. (You bought a computer to send email, not to revel in the layers of perfectly sculpted plastic shards that you had to tear out of the box to get at it.) One possible by-product of such a system could be that, without society’s relentless call to consume, people might realize that they would be happier with less than they currently possess. Why burden yourself with your own vacuum cleaner, lawn mower, coffee grinder, crock pot, electric heating pad, washing machine, or any of the other myriad contraptions that clutter up the average middle-class American apartment? All it takes is a moment of reflection to realize that each is used for an hour or two a week, if that. Why not pool resources with your neighbors, put the best appliances in a hall closet, give the extras away, and replace the broken ones (they always break) with really good ones meant to last, which are worth repairing and which you would be stretched to buy on your own? At the same time, you get to know your neighbors. Less is more.
We know that America’s relationship to stuff has to change, and digital tools give us the opportunity to design the kind of marketplace we want to live with. In the process of constructing it, we transform our communities and ourselves. We heal our hearts, pursuing the path of a more transparent, less materialist society. The earth is calling us to embrace a new politics of the sacred, one which will expand the safe space where the heart can be revealed, available for connection. As hard as it might be to believe such a transformation is possible, in fact, a profound change might be closer than anyone might think, ready to be expressed in how we live our daily lives. Along the fringes, far from the shopping mall, a yearning can be felt for a different kind of commerce.
Thanks to Kaliya Hamlin for reading a draft of this article and offering extremely helpful comments and suggested revisions.
18
THE BNOTE: LOCAL CURRENCY FOR BALTIMORE
JEFF DICKEN AND MICHAEL TEW
Even before printing a single note, everywhere we go in Baltimore people have already heard of the BNote, and businesses are signing on to accept them when we launch in spring 2011. We are finding that people support the idea of pioneering an alternative economic system, one that benefits people instead of corporations. Google searches now show websites referencing Baltimore’s new local currency, and the local press radio is starting to cover us. Our currency design contest went global when blogs picked up the announcement. When the BNote arrives in Baltimore, only the birds will be surprised. In less than a year, we have grown from a bright idea into an organization on track to establish a local currency with broad community participation.
Much of this progress is due to the diversity and positive vision that the Evolver Social Movement has fostered among its local groups. Each local Evolver group puts on a monthly event, called a Spore, about topics relevant to the transformation. A Baltimore Spore on local currencies took place in the summer of 2009. Damien Nichols, who attended, asked his friend Michael Tew to join him at the next Spore to meet the people who seemed to share his activist vision. Michael’s background is in both microfinance and legislative lobbying, and he had been looking for an opportunity to advance alternative economic systems on a community level. At the Spore, Michael participated in the discussion that followed the panel, and was invited to make a short presentation at the following Spore on the subject of microfinance. There, he put forth the possibility that, by the end of 2012, a microfinance-based economy could become the dominant form of economic organization for most people on the planet. Moreover, he proposed that Baltimore could be a good place to bring together microfinance with a local currency.
After his presentation, Michael met Jeff Dicken, a long-time supporter of microfinance efforts who has a background in information technology and the arts. During this and subsequent conversations, the importance of a local currency to a resilient community in face of economic meltdown became increasingly clear. Soon after, Jill Harrison, a social activist with experience in nonprofits, joined the team, and when Michael moved to Baltimore in March 2010, they began to have regular meetings. As word spread among Evolvers about the effort, more people expressed a willingness to help. By the end of June an effective and growing team of enthusiastic volunteers was gathering.
The next step was to address some basic questions: Should the currency system use a debit system or paper money? What organizational form should the governing body adopt? If we went with paper, how should we design and print the currency? How to attract community participation? We distributed the notes from each meeting to the group, including web links to resources, so everyone stayed informed and involved; we also discussed many of the system’s features informally by email between meetings so that face-to-face conversations could be more productive. We decided to issue only one- and five-dollar value notes in the first year, and to call the currency the BNote.
The UK–based Lewes Pound website’s guide to starting a currency and Peter North’s Local Money provided invaluable guidance as we put together the strongest features of other currencies already in existence.
Our currency would be convertible to and from U.S. dollars, and we chose to restrict the pilot launch to a specific, easily identifiable neighborhood. The Hampden community turned out to have many of the features important to the adoption of a local currency:
Small-business support. The Hampden Merchant’s Association lists 162 independent businesses as members. There are few chain stores, and Hampden residents tend to do most shopping locally.
Defined geographic area. Hampden is in the heart of Baltimore, bounded by the Jones Falls waterway on the west and Hopkins University to the east, with clear boundaries to the north and south as well.
Community. Historically, the area was populated by immigrant mill workers. While recent years have seen much gentrification, a strong sense of community identity still exists, and there are many longstanding community organizations. At the same time, a wave of young, progressive Baltimoreans have moved into the neighborhood, opening businesses and providing new energy.
To encourage residents to think about the nature of money, and to inspire a continuing dialogue that will help shape the details of the system we establish, we have had a series
of community meetings. These start with videos about currency or economic subjects, followed by a discussion about the BNote. We encourage people to get our monthly email newsletter, the BNote Buzz, and borrow materials from our small circulating library of books, articles, and DVDs. In addition, we’ve made some videos and animations that present our vision to stimulate interest in the project.
To encourage community participation, we launched a currency design contest at the annual HampdenFest in September 2010, where volunteers staffed a booth and connected with people from the neighborhood.
U.S. dollars will be convertible into BNotes at a 10 percent discount; ten dollars will buy eleven BNotes, each of which circulates at a value equivalent to one dollar. In this way, people get an immediate benefit from adopting the currency, and merchants who are able to spend their BNotes with other businesses or residents in the system do not see any negative financial impact.
Merchants can use the BNotes they accept in a number of ways. They can use them to buy stock or services for their business from others in the network. They can pay themselves and/or their employees partially in BNotes. They can give them as change, to encourage circulation. They can use them for their own purchases. And if for some reason they choose to exchange some back for dollars, BNotes may be redeemed at the same rate: eleven BNotes for ten dollars. There is a clear financial benefit to using the notes, and this speeds up the circulation.
The more extensive the network of storefront businesses, independent service providers, artisans, and residents who accept BNotes, the longer the notes will circulate (of course, the ideal is them to circulate indefinitely), and the stronger the system will be.
What Comes After Money Page 18