There is a growing movement towards peer-to-peer value exchange and production, prompted by a variety of things, like economic conditions, shifting cultural values, exploration into collective intelligence, and further enabled by social technologies. I’ve been tracking the online marketplaces that have been cropping up for sharing, swapping, gifting and renting, as well as sites that give people different kinds of opportunity to share skills and knowledge, innovate, and work collaboratively both on and offline. Below are a few sites I’ve come across, please add any I’ve missed.
People-Powered Markets for Gifting / Sharing / Swapping / Renting / Value Exchange

http://www.cleanfleetreport.com/clean-fleet-articles/zipcar-ipo-car-share/
Car Sharing
Ride Sharing

http://www.webwire.com/ViewPressRel.asp?aId=133961

http://www.deskmag.com/en/820-coworking-spaces-worldwide-statistics
What sites have you seen that are offering new ways to exchange or create value?
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Upcoming will be a post on People-Powered Capital, exploring platforms for crowdfunding, investment, and lending.
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Good list. Two quick additions:
ShareZen: http://sharezen.com/
And Lisa Gansky’s site: http://meshing.it/
(though it’s not a service and I see you have it on your blogroll, they have a great directory of sharing businesses)
Hey V,
I really appreciate this post. I’m investigating the list now.
I’ve only used two of these services.
1. Zipcar. I use this for occasional trips out of whichever city i happen to find myself in. Most recently for a day trip to Chukanut national forest North of Seattle. $115 for a convertible Mini-cooper that’s parked only a few blocks away? It’s an amazing deal.
2. Airbnb. I use this to land in new cities when I move. Most recently landing at The Virginian, an old hotel that is now apartments and Airbnb spaces in Bell Town Seattle. Someday I imagine I’ll be able to Airbnb apartments for months anywhere in the world. This is going to revolutionize hotels, apartments, everything.
Best,
Ev
Hi Vanessa,
Here are more for the list:
http://www.collaborativeconsumption.com/the-movement/snapshot-of-examples.php
Rachel
nice! i was wondering if you had something like that compiled on the site. thanks for sharing the link.
Hey Venessa, also a list at the below link, which is also extensive offering a few worthwhile additions:
http://www.shareable.net/blog/gen-y-guide-to-collaborative-consumption
Our list was created with Gen Y / young adults in mind.
EatWellGuide.org has listings of 20,000+ sustainable, locally grown and organic vendors.
Our foundation works with local organizations and vendors to provide an important network of resources, as well as a mapping tool that allows travelers to route a travel itinerary to find local eating options throughout the US and Canada (and it really enhances the quality of a road trip).
hi jamie,
sounds like a search engine though, not a marketplace.
Fair enough; tho the model of search engine as marketplace is certainly central to our online experience, yes? A key purpose of Eat Well Guide is to build community for often marginalized food producers. This is why i, perhaps erroneously, thought you’d find the Guide appropriate; it seems to me that the people-to-people exchange of info might fit into your evolutionary model. BTW – thanks for your terrific post!
Givmo (https://www.givmo.com) is a gifting community where money is donated to charity with every item given.
Sharing and people-centered local economies anyone. It is above all about putting at the centre of business and economics.
http://forestofdean.socialgo.com/magazine/read/the-case-for-local-sustainable-enterprise_38.html
Wow. Great to be featured on a wonderful blog!
Sanjukt Saha / Founder / http://www.onebillionminds.com
Hi Venessa,
In the same vein as ‘coworking’, have a look at http://www.kodesk.com .This is a real people-powered market, though it is best described as peer-to-peer sharing by his founder Sebastien (@sarbogast).
For information, after the big 2010 success, we will be organizing the 2nd European Conference on Coworking in Berlin. I will be moderating a camp on ‘Innovation and Coworking’. See here: http://coworkingconference.com/
Phil
Nice reference to some wonderful services.
Even though I have not used any of the sites listed above, I have used a long distance carpooling service in the UK which works on the idea of collaborative consumption.
I used to travel alone on week-ends from London to Birmingham atleast 2 time a week in my car(simply because it is more convenient and since the train service is less reliable). But now I carpool(collaborate) with others who want to make the same trip.
On the web service, http://www.blablacar.com , I post my trip and find(or get found by) other who are making the same trip and share the ride with them. I save on my petrol and toll costs(so do the others who carpool with me), find my trips more sociable and also together we reduce our CO2 emissions. Security in doing so (carpooling with strangers) was my biggest fear, but the service on the site allows the users to list their preferences and at the same time allows the carpool community to give ratings based on their carpooling experience with each other, this really helped me make my decision, as to who I want to carpool with.
All in all I am very happy with this service and my idea and perception of collaboration has really broadened. And now I will probably start using some of the services (depending on my needs) which you have mentioned above.
I hope more and more people start adapting service like these.
Cheers,
Darcy
thanks for sharing, darcy! i mostly work from home and my car just sits outside doing nothing. i’d love to be able to rent it out, but i don’t think that service has arrived in our area just yet.
Hi Darcy,
Nice to read your story. During one year (2002) I commuted from London to Oxford. I enjoyed the landscape travelling through Henley-on-Thames, passing by the Manoir of George Harrison on the long and winding roads .. Unfortunately carpooling was not so commonplace at that time. Driving alone is not fun and the name ‘blablacar’ tells it all ! Oxford also has a very good P+R (Park & Ride) infrastructure making it even more amenable to carpooling. Some public infrastructure can act like ‘magnet’ or ‘reinforcer’ for the development of collaborative consumption.
Back in Belgium, I travel by train because our network here is tremendously rich. For trips below 10 miles, I use my bike. If by chance you come over to Belgium, the system here is called VAP : http://www.vap-vap.be/spip.php?article45 ; their approach is slightly different from ‘blablacar’. VAP is a typical example of partnership between ‘people-powered’ services and ‘public’ services. A pure ‘people-powered’ carpooling system will be soon available also in Belgium : http://www.djengo.be/ ;
It is obvious that technology is key in the development of these ‘people-powered’ services. As you mention, trust is an important ingredient and, community-vetting is becoming the most appropriate mechanism to ensure one can share and collaborate without fear.
Phil
In Germany, when it comes to peer-2-peer carsharing, you will notice Autonetzer as one of the majors.
Thank you for your post Frauke. I only knew tamyca(http://www.tamyca.de) as a carsharing service, which seems to be even bigger.
Whoops, failed at creating a link and didn’t find an edit function.
Here is the correct one: tamyca carsharing