Hey guys!
I'm Bill from GCFLearnFree.org and today I want to talk about the sharing economy.
Now, what do I mean by that exactly?
Well, the sharing economy is a general term that's
applied to a whole bunch of different tools. A really good example of this is eBay.
eBay allows people to sell items they no longer need and
makes it easy for other people to buy them. eBay acts as a go-between or
middleman in this situation. They make it easier for these people to find one another.
The sharing economy is based around this idea and it takes it one step further.
Some really good examples of this include Uber and Lyft. clip
There are smartphone apps that work basically like a taxi service
but there are no actual taxi drivers involved. On the one hand you have someone
who is looking for a ride
and on the other you have someone with a car who this willing to drive that person
around for a set price.
Just like eBay, uber and Lyft act as a go-between this situation.
They make it easy for these two different sides to find each other.
and they handle all the payment and transaction information, which means there's no
reason to exchange cash in person.
Andd they also allow drivers and riders review and rank each other
see you can easily see who's a good driver and who's not.Another really great example is AirBNB.
AirBNB works basically the same way as Uber and Lyft,
but instead of people looking for a ride, it's people looking for a place to stay.
On the one hand you have someone looking for a place to stay
and on the other you have someone willing to rent out or share their home.
Again, AirBNB acts as the go-between.
They allow people to find each other, leave reviews,
and they handle all the transaction information.
As these services have become more popular, they've also raised a number of legal and safety issues
and they're not to be ignored. For a lot of people, I think it's a question of how comfortable
you are staying in someone else's house
or riding in someone else's car.
Fundamentally, it's an issue of trust, right?
Personally, I know I felt the same way before I used a service like this
and when I first got started I spent a lot of time reading reviews really carefully
and just trying to get a sense of what to expect. After I'd used them a few times,
I felt a lot more comfortable, and like I could really use these tools in my everyday life.
I think the Internet is a really powerful tool for connecting people
and helping them to trust one another.
And ultimately, that's what the sharing economy is all about: trust.
Anyway, that's all we've got! I really hope this video has been helpful in
explaining what the sharing economy is and how it works.