Glen Weyl is one of the more interesting thinkers I’ve encountered. His ideas are so futuristic they’re hard to tie to any political camp—He ends up arguing for, among other things, a rethinking both the corporation and the nation state. Here’s me summarizing and making sense of some of his ideas.
My biggest take-away from this article is that “coordination capability” is the new moat that’s required to remedy, or at least counter the drawbacks from either “individual monopoly” or “group monopoly”.
In an “individual monopoly” scenario, the individual creativity gets maximized, however if the system’s “coordination capability” does not match up with the democratized creativity, resulting individual cell swells without other cells also grow, or the tie between cells gets jammed or severed, eventually cells may explode and the system may collapse.
In a “group monopoly” scenario, the group’s capability as a whole gets maximized through the most efficient run of public goods, such as the transportation, public health decision, however if each individual cell stops growing the system may run static.
I would argue by injecting the right “coordination capability” either system could thrive though. For example to match the explosion of individual creativity we may just need a radically transparent, radically de-regulated, yet lightning fast and efficient distribution system; to reduce the rigidity of the statism, allowing capitalism at each individual level may just be a solution.
The last but not the least is that from the economics perspective obviously we’ll have to consider the cost and the added benefit of building such a coordination capability.
"The paradox is that we gain our individuality from our relationships to others — that’s what makes us unique.
Each person on earth is represented by the intersection of the groups of which they are members. "
I think this gives groups too much explanatory power. People aren't merely the intersection of their groups.
Consider a family that lives together in the wilderness, so they only have one group. Each person within that group will still have their own unique characteristics. Their DNA, while related, is still distinct for each person. I have commonalities with my siblings, but my personality is unique, and that's not merely because of distinct relationships I have compared to them, but because of innate differences. My ordering within my family group (second youngest) provides uniqueness as well.
I think considering the value of groups in shaping individuals is a useful lens, but I don't find it useful to *primarily* see individuals as a function of the groups they're apart of, as that is too reductive and leaves out the richness of diversity within groups.
Glen's Vision, especially on radical markets has guided us on creating a platform for funding public goods, by the community using the concept of quadratic funding.
My biggest take-away from this article is that “coordination capability” is the new moat that’s required to remedy, or at least counter the drawbacks from either “individual monopoly” or “group monopoly”.
In an “individual monopoly” scenario, the individual creativity gets maximized, however if the system’s “coordination capability” does not match up with the democratized creativity, resulting individual cell swells without other cells also grow, or the tie between cells gets jammed or severed, eventually cells may explode and the system may collapse.
In a “group monopoly” scenario, the group’s capability as a whole gets maximized through the most efficient run of public goods, such as the transportation, public health decision, however if each individual cell stops growing the system may run static.
I would argue by injecting the right “coordination capability” either system could thrive though. For example to match the explosion of individual creativity we may just need a radically transparent, radically de-regulated, yet lightning fast and efficient distribution system; to reduce the rigidity of the statism, allowing capitalism at each individual level may just be a solution.
The last but not the least is that from the economics perspective obviously we’ll have to consider the cost and the added benefit of building such a coordination capability.
"The paradox is that we gain our individuality from our relationships to others — that’s what makes us unique.
Each person on earth is represented by the intersection of the groups of which they are members. "
I think this gives groups too much explanatory power. People aren't merely the intersection of their groups.
Consider a family that lives together in the wilderness, so they only have one group. Each person within that group will still have their own unique characteristics. Their DNA, while related, is still distinct for each person. I have commonalities with my siblings, but my personality is unique, and that's not merely because of distinct relationships I have compared to them, but because of innate differences. My ordering within my family group (second youngest) provides uniqueness as well.
I think considering the value of groups in shaping individuals is a useful lens, but I don't find it useful to *primarily* see individuals as a function of the groups they're apart of, as that is too reductive and leaves out the richness of diversity within groups.
Glen's Vision, especially on radical markets has guided us on creating a platform for funding public goods, by the community using the concept of quadratic funding.
And I would love to know your views on using the same platform for running https://www.beondeck.com/access-fund.
Here are some links for more context:
1. https://gitcoin.co/grants/
2. http://downtownstimulus.com/
Happy to connect you with the creator of this platform. - https://twitter.com/owocki