Portlandia Satirizes The Sharing Economy. What Does It Mean?
Earlier this year, the popular IFC show Portlandia produced a comical clip that promoted the characters’ fictitious sharing economy site called “Rent It Out PDX”. The duo pitches that you can rent out your car, extra space in your fridge, and even your electric toothbrush. They end up renting out nearly every belonging they own. They have to live on the roof because it’s the only space left in their home.
It’s hilarious. Obviously the clip is based satirical in nature. It’s supposed to be funny, and it does so by exaggerating a concept. Even as the cofounder of a sharing economy company, I couldn’t help but to laugh my butt off.
But do they have a point? Are there parts of the sharing economy that are too much? Where do we draw the line?
Cars and homes have become the largest categories in the sharing economy space. Millions of people are comfortable using platforms like Lyft, Airbnb, and RelayRides. But what is the next level? Can we really take it any further?
Concepts that push the boundaries of the status quo look ridiculous by their very nature. They chart into ridiculousness because they have to. As Peter Thiel evangelizes in Zero To One, they create something where there was previously nothing. The only way identify the breaking point of user reception is to go past it. Then, return back a few ticks and you’ve identified a boundary for acceptance.
Every revolutionary industry goes through this natural ebb and flow until an equilibrium is reached. Even the consumer internet space itself went through this guess-and-check over the last 15 years. Think about the recent resurgence of products and concepts that failed miserably ten years ago.
Postmates, Deliv, and Instacart all offer services to get items delivered to your house within a few hours. However, this space is infamously littered with the catastrophic failures of companies like WebVan and HomeGrocer. But these modern versions are succeeding today because consumer paradigms have changed. The concept was still so novel in the web 1.0 era that consumers hadn’t baked it into their lives like they do now. They didn’t expect it, nor did they graciously adopt it. It’s a prime example of when technology can often outpace culture. Same-day delivery took only a few years to master the technology, but 15 years to harness the culture.
For a brief period, I was picking up on sentiment that something like an Airbnb for dogs would be ridiculous. It was kind of the joke du jour in the startup world, or at least in my circles. To be fair, this was before I had heard about Rover or DogVacay. As such, I agreed. “Yes, that would be absurd!” Fast forward the clock, and it isn’t ridiculous. Far from it. I use one of the two services at least every month. This begs the question, “Is something novel only ridiculous in the short term?”
I think that it would be irresponsible for me to answer in the absolute, so I think it warrants a discussion. The industry has a bit of maturing to do over the next decade. Like any nascent industry, we are still finding our way in the sharing economy. There’s bound to be a lot of legal, cultural, and logistical changes in the coming years. Many companies will give their concept a try. For those that don’t have a primed market, they’ll fail. If the cyclical patterns of consumer attitudes remain consistent, they may work again ten years later.
Here at Whttl, we’re in it for the long haul. No matter how this thing plays out, we know that there is an opportunity for one company to make sense of all the options in this budding space. We’re working hard to become that company. We believe that the sharing economy is on par to reshape commerce with the same scale that the consumer internet and social networks did. Fred Wilson thinks so too.
For the record, I’m not advocating a complete acceptance of just any sharing economy concept. I draw a line in the sand with sharing my toothbrush. But my beard trimmer…just kidding.
If you found value in this, it would be tremendous if you scrolled down a little further and hit the “Recommend” button.
Greg Muender is the founder of Whttl, described as the “Kayak.com for the sharing economy.” Use it to compare dozens of different providers and marketplaces at once, including RelayRides, DogVacay, and HomeJoy. Drop Greg a line via greg<at>whttl/dot/com. For further reading, check out the Official Whttl Blog.
