Sharing is one of the primal instincts that mankind is endowed with. It may not be as powerful a drive as the instinct to survive, but it is as omnipresent as any innate human behavior is. In fact, we inherited it from our primate forefathers.
In an interesting research on primates, Duke University researchers gave food to bonobo chimpanzee, while another was in an adjacent room. The bonobo had the choice to eat the food alone or open the door and let the other bonobo join in to share the food. Bonobos voluntarily opened the door and shared their food.
So does that make sharing an innate human behavior? No, may be an easy answer to that question, as most sharing does appear to be acquired as part of social skills. But the answer may not be that simple if we consider the fact that sharing behavior is only a means to an end, and not an end in itself. Therefore, if sharing is driven by one of the innate instincts of survival or any of the primal human needs such as food, clothing and shelter, sharing obviously becomes a natural instinct to survive.
Well, innate or not, to share is indeed human, but to expect nothing in return is divine.
It therefore ensues that all human sharing has to be equitable, particularly when it sustains an economy. The billions of social shares that we engage in everyday must be rewarding us with some level of gratification. Otherwise we wouldn't be doing it. Technology is enabling humanity to share a lot more than just social share, spinning off a brand new sharing industry that’s thriving on that natural human instinct to “share.” With the advent of decentralized networking, sharing is becoming easy, secure, private, seamless, and of course rewarding enough to welcome this new kid on the economics block: SHARONOMICS. It’s about time we defined this technology-enabled economics of human behavior.
Sharonomics is a portmanteau word of “share” & “economics” that introduces a new branch of knowledge concerned with the production, distribution and consumption of wealth based on incentivized and equitable sharing of tangible or intangible assets with peers in an automated decentralized ecosystem.
