“We have an ownership society now, but we’re moving toward an access society, where you’re not defined by the things you own but by the experiences you have." A recent statement made by AirBnB Co-Founder, Brian Chesky, to GIGAOM.

The vision of moving from an ownership society towards an access based society is one I totally share and have faith in. As the global population grows beyond 7 Billion and our resources face increasing pressures: how can we assume our GDP will continue to grow exponentially and how can we assume that our living standards will not be affected in the face of wars, financial and climate change disasters too. Ultimately how will we survive if we don't embrace a more collaborative way of allocating our resources...

Ownership is not necessary to thrive, as Timothy Ferris would point out you no longer have to be a millionaire to live a millionaire lifestyle. No longer do you need to own a multimillion pound/dollar yacht or tropical island paradise to holiday like the rich and famous, you simply need to access these spaces. AirBnB is a service that will allow anyone to do exactly this, i.e. rent access to extraordinary, ordinary and un-extradoinary spaces. Similarly AirBnB will let you charge access to the spaces you can provide to individuals, whether they be extraordinary, ordinary or un-extradoinary (e.g. a treehouse, an apartment or a sofa-bed). What matters to people leading these exciting collaborative lifestyles is, as Brian Chesky points out, the experience. 

AirBnB is a perfect example of a business built ready for the those already leading "collaborative lifestyles". From reading my last post you may have noticed "collaborative lifestyles" as one of the pillars of the "intergenerational society" that if established may help us tackle global challenges and allow us to continue to thrive as a planet in more ways than GDP can measure alone. Collaborative lifestyles are also part of a perhaps bigger concept called "Collaborative Consumption", a thought led by Rachel Botsman who I was lucky to meet several months ago at an RSA event in London. Rachel's work has identified several ways business models are evolving to become more collaborative (see table below). 

These examples are exciting becuase they show how resources can be more efficently leveraged by business to create real value whilst at the same time operate in a fashion that's good for the planet/society at large. If individuals, businesses and governments can shift their thinking away from "ownership" and toward "access" of resources - I'm sure they're will be benefits for us all.

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It was at Influencer Conference 2011, just a few weeks ago, that I was fortunate enough to question one of SustainAbility's lead innovation researcher's and consultant's (Kyra Choucroun) on the call for an intergenerational society. An intergenerational society could be a solution to the problems we have ignored/are only beggining to witness as a result of the ever expanding human footprint on the planet.

Key takeaways from the talk:

• GDP cannot remain our only measure of progress, to paraphrase JFK it measures all but that which makes life worth living. This was demonstrated when US GDP rose during weekend of the Exxon Valdez Oil Spil.
• The planet's resources are finite, the resources of future generations have been stolen over the last half century, packaged and sold as GDP.
• Exponential growth in GDP therefore must be an illusion that cannot continue forever.
• The solution to the problems created by over-exploiting our planets resources cannot be solved by any one individual or company, it will take a personal responsibility by us all in order to create the intergenerational society needed to correct things.
• An intergenerational society is founded on a number of pillars and trends including: collaboarative lifestyles, abolishing what is known as the toothbrush affect and asking ourselves the right questions. See Kyra's posts for more information.

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A month after arriving back from a summer tour of HK, China & India, I'm finally getting around to writing up my blog posts. Here's is the first post about my explorations in Hong Kong, it's dedicated to Mathias Holzman, who showed me great hospitality during my stay most of all by letting me stay at his apartment and introducing me to so many great people. Thank you Mathias!

Check out the post below:

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"Disruptive innovation at its best"

Adam Kidron is an ex-record producer turned serial entrepreneur. I met up with Adam and the Senior Director of Marketing, Charlie Bailie,  of his latest venture "Beyond Oblivion" for lunch last February. In just one short hour Adam had convinced me that his new business model was the way of the future for the music industry. Ever since piracy in the form of peer to peer networks has been around there has also been the demand for free music by consumers. The music industry still requiring to be paid, whilst all of this is going on. Services such as Spotify have proven to be the most successful models in solving this problem up until now, but questions remain regarding the long term viability of such subscription/advertising based models.

Beyond Oblivion licenses all music everywhere. Every time a song is played then the music-playing-device records it and a small royalty is paid to the publisher, up until the point of 92% of the original license fee paid for by the device manufacturer. If you understand this then you will foresee the huge disruption such a business could potentially cause. I for one like the sound of this and will be watching the progress of beyond oblivion very closely! Many thanks once again to Sandbox who made this lunch possible! You guys are awesome!

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"We have to be the change"

John Elkington is perhaps the foremost expert in the world when it comes to Sustainability issues. He is recognised for pioneering the concept of the “Triple Bottom Line” and for the last three decades he has consulted some of the world’s largest organisations, NGO’s and governments as the number one thought leader in his field.

At a Sandbox dinner with John in February, 2011 – Sandboxers discussed the antecedents of a more sustainable society; change that John anticipates will take place rapidly across the next 2-3 decades , unfortunately without strong leadership or a fundamental grass roots movement many foresee that the antecedent will be that of serious exogenous shocks to our system, such as war, depression or climate disaster. Our meeting with John proved undeniably to be one of the most inspirational I have ever had the pleasure of. I remain optimistic that society can adapt before these pessimistic factors may take effect.

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'Why can't more socially driven organisations act with a commercial mind-set'

Leila Janah is an entrepreneur from Silicon Valley, USA, a place in the world nick-named the "cradle of innovation" and the birthplace of  corporate giants including Hewlett Packard, Apple &  Google. However Leila's company is an award-winning social enterprise called Samasource, whose aim it is is to connect marginalized workers in developing & deprived economies with work via the internet. In countries where the income per person is less than $3 a day, Samasource is inspirationally establishing teams and securing structure to what is typically a distant 'haven't got my hands dirty' crowdsourcing approach to delivering work for such people.

Firms buy Samasource's services because, the company is thinking like a real company, building a brand based on value and quality, not just simply because it provides benefit to thousands around the world and so that therefore should be enough to sell it to you.

So after enjoying a wonderful Thai meal in Holborn with Leila and a few other friends, I can't help to think why can't more socially driven organisations adopt this mindset. Samasource proves that this mentality serves only to benefit any organisation of such a kind.

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"The age of print newspapers is over"

Andrew Rashbass is the Chief Executive of the Economist Group. I met Andrew as a result of an invitation to the Group's Headquarters in London in December 2010, to discuss how online communities can be leveraged to engage demographically diverse sets of people, spread across the world, bonded by their shared common values, motifs and passions. The discussion took place in Andrew's top floor office over lunch and what stood out for me was Andrew's prediction that print newspapers are already dead. Indeed, when someone is doing what you already do for free, that's gotta be a bad sign.

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"Treating the Causes of Un-sustainability, not the Symptoms"

Geoff Lye is the Executive Chairman of SustainAbility, sister company to John Elkington's Volans, whom first coined the term "Tripple Bottom Line". Both firms are considered pioneers within Sustainable Consulting and global thought leaders on Social Enterprise. I was fortunate enough to sit opposite Geoff at a dinner after the 2010 Skoll EMERGE conference of Social Enterprise. One thing that stuck in my mind from my conversation with Geoff was the way he stated that the success of his company over the last 20 years has relied heavily on the fact its consulting services aim to treat the causes of un-sustainability not its symptoms. I believe this is so important as we attempt to tackle global issues such as over-population, climate change and world poverty over the course of the next century.

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