Micki Krimmel, NeighborGoods: Sharing is Caring, The Economy of Collaborative Consumption

How can we make the change from an economy based on ownership to one based on sharing? In these hard economic times people are constantly searching for new and innovative ways of getting the things they need that don’t involve purchasing them. Micki Krimmel, the founder of NeighborGoods discusses how lending, and loaning between friends and neighbors online will then translate into the creation of lasting local communities in the real world. This new collaborative economy will allow us to get more value out of the things that we own and strengthen the social fabric of our networks.

Some take-away points from Micki’s talk are:

• Sharing with neighbors has demonstrated an improvement of life in local communities, spreading into the overall economy
• Exchanging visible goods creates trust in local neighborhoods because of the social value of lending
• More connected, engaged citizenry comes from sharing and engaging with each other
• With more risk and less guarantee, a real trusting relationship is built