WEBVTT 00:00:00.258 --> 00:00:02.079 So if someone asked you 00:00:02.079 --> 00:00:04.841 for the three words that would sum up 00:00:04.841 --> 00:00:08.723 your reputation, what would you say? 00:00:08.723 --> 00:00:11.118 How would people describe your judgment, 00:00:11.118 --> 00:00:14.875 your knowledge, your behaviors, in different situations? 00:00:14.875 --> 00:00:17.242 Today I'd like to explore with you 00:00:17.242 --> 00:00:18.914 why the answer to this question 00:00:18.914 --> 00:00:21.055 will become profoundly important 00:00:21.055 --> 00:00:25.652 in an age where reputation will be your most valuable asset. NOTE Paragraph 00:00:25.652 --> 00:00:28.235 I'd like to start by introducing you to someone 00:00:28.235 --> 00:00:31.837 whose life has been changed by a marketplace 00:00:31.837 --> 00:00:33.940 fueled by reputation. 00:00:33.940 --> 00:00:37.030 Sebastian Sandys has been a bed and breakfast host 00:00:37.030 --> 00:00:39.569 on Airbnb since 2008. 00:00:39.569 --> 00:00:42.500 I caught up with him recently, where, over the course 00:00:42.500 --> 00:00:45.364 of several cups of tea, he told me how 00:00:45.364 --> 00:00:47.747 hosting guests from all over the world 00:00:47.747 --> 00:00:49.214 has enriched his life. 00:00:49.214 --> 00:00:52.587 More than 50 people have come to stay in the 18th-century 00:00:52.587 --> 00:00:55.619 watchhouse he lives in with his cat, Squeak. 00:00:55.619 --> 00:01:00.051 Now, I mention Squeak because Sebastian's first guest 00:01:00.051 --> 00:01:04.002 happened to see a rather large mouse run across the kitchen, 00:01:04.002 --> 00:01:06.595 and she promised that she would refrain from leaving 00:01:06.595 --> 00:01:10.017 a bad review on one condition: he got a cat. 00:01:10.017 --> 00:01:14.084 And so Sebastian bought Squeak to protect his reputation. NOTE Paragraph 00:01:14.084 --> 00:01:17.243 Now, as many of you know, Airbnb is a peer-to-peer 00:01:17.243 --> 00:01:21.194 marketplace that matches people who have space to rent 00:01:21.194 --> 00:01:23.979 with people who are looking for a place to stay 00:01:23.979 --> 00:01:26.666 in over 192 countries. 00:01:26.666 --> 00:01:29.356 The places being rented out are things that you might 00:01:29.356 --> 00:01:32.188 expect, like spare rooms and holiday homes, 00:01:32.188 --> 00:01:34.761 but part of the magic is the unique places 00:01:34.761 --> 00:01:38.699 that you can now access: treehouses, teepees, 00:01:38.699 --> 00:01:40.791 airplane hangars, igloos. 00:01:40.791 --> 00:01:44.250 If you don't like the hotel, there's a castle down the road 00:01:44.250 --> 00:01:47.083 that you can rent for 5,000 dollars a night. 00:01:47.083 --> 00:01:50.431 It's a fantastic example of how technology 00:01:50.431 --> 00:01:52.147 is creating a market 00:01:52.147 --> 00:01:54.646 for things that never had a marketplace before. NOTE Paragraph 00:01:54.646 --> 00:01:57.777 Now let me show you these heat maps of Paris 00:01:57.777 --> 00:02:00.335 to see how insanely fast it's growing. 00:02:00.335 --> 00:02:02.999 This image here is from 2008. 00:02:02.999 --> 00:02:06.718 The pink dots represent host properties. 00:02:06.718 --> 00:02:10.711 Even four years ago, letting strangers stay in your home 00:02:10.711 --> 00:02:13.203 seemed like a crazy idea. 00:02:13.203 --> 00:02:15.424 Now the same view in 2010. 00:02:15.424 --> 00:02:18.226 And now, 2012. 00:02:18.226 --> 00:02:23.365 There is an Airbnb host on almost every main street in Paris. 00:02:23.365 --> 00:02:27.996 Now, what's happening here is people are realizing 00:02:27.996 --> 00:02:32.357 the power of technology to unlock the idling capacity 00:02:32.357 --> 00:02:35.275 and value of all kinds of assets, 00:02:35.275 --> 00:02:38.733 from skills to spaces to material possessions, 00:02:38.733 --> 00:02:42.212 in ways and on a scale never possible before. 00:02:42.212 --> 00:02:45.436 It's an economy and culture called collaborative consumption, 00:02:45.436 --> 00:02:48.228 and, through it, people like Sebastian 00:02:48.228 --> 00:02:50.299 are becoming micro-entrepreneurs. 00:02:50.299 --> 00:02:52.997 They're empowered to make money and save money 00:02:52.997 --> 00:02:55.696 from their existing assets. NOTE Paragraph 00:02:55.696 --> 00:02:58.215 But the real magic and the secret source behind 00:02:58.215 --> 00:03:00.984 collaborative consumption marketplaces like Airbnb 00:03:00.984 --> 00:03:03.619 isn't the inventory or the money. 00:03:03.619 --> 00:03:07.136 It's using the power of technology to build trust 00:03:07.136 --> 00:03:08.627 between strangers. 00:03:08.627 --> 00:03:12.159 This side of Airbnb really hit home to Sebastian last summer 00:03:12.159 --> 00:03:13.434 during the London riots. 00:03:13.434 --> 00:03:16.140 He woke up around 9, and he checked his email 00:03:16.140 --> 00:03:19.317 and he saw a bunch of messages all asking him 00:03:19.317 --> 00:03:20.839 if he was okay. 00:03:20.839 --> 00:03:23.011 Former guests from around the world had seen that 00:03:23.011 --> 00:03:25.104 the riots were happening just down the street, and wanted 00:03:25.104 --> 00:03:27.405 to check if he needed anything. 00:03:27.405 --> 00:03:30.590 Sebastian actually said to me, he said, "Thirteen former guests 00:03:30.590 --> 00:03:34.753 contacted me before my own mother rang." (Laughter) NOTE Paragraph 00:03:34.753 --> 00:03:39.130 Now, this little anecdote gets to the heart of why 00:03:39.130 --> 00:03:42.034 I'm really passionate about collaborative consumption, 00:03:42.034 --> 00:03:44.584 and why, after I finished my book, I decided 00:03:44.584 --> 00:03:48.274 I'm going to try and spread this into a global movement. 00:03:48.274 --> 00:03:51.931 Because at its core, it's about empowerment. 00:03:51.931 --> 00:03:56.092 It's about empowering people to make meaningful connections, 00:03:56.092 --> 00:03:59.014 connections that are enabling us to rediscover 00:03:59.014 --> 00:04:02.413 a humanness that we've lost somewhere along the way, 00:04:02.413 --> 00:04:06.733 by engaging in marketplaces like Airbnb, like Kickstarter, 00:04:06.733 --> 00:04:09.966 like Etsy, that are built on personal relationships 00:04:09.966 --> 00:04:12.993 versus empty transactions. NOTE Paragraph 00:04:12.993 --> 00:04:16.321 Now the irony is that these ideas are actually taking us back 00:04:16.321 --> 00:04:19.614 to old market principles and collaborative behaviors 00:04:19.614 --> 00:04:21.326 that are hard-wired in all of us. 00:04:21.326 --> 00:04:24.015 They're just being reinvented in ways that are relevant 00:04:24.015 --> 00:04:25.703 for the Facebook age. 00:04:25.703 --> 00:04:29.255 We're literally beginning to realize that we have wired 00:04:29.255 --> 00:04:33.470 our world to share, swap, rent, barter or trade 00:04:33.470 --> 00:04:37.204 just about anything. We're sharing our cars on WhipCar, 00:04:37.204 --> 00:04:40.406 our bikes on Spinlister, our offices on Loosecubes, 00:04:40.406 --> 00:04:43.205 our gardens on Landshare. We're lending and borrowing 00:04:43.205 --> 00:04:46.102 money from strangers on Zopa and Lending Club. 00:04:46.102 --> 00:04:48.620 We are trading lessons on everything from sushi-making 00:04:48.620 --> 00:04:50.206 to coding on Skillshare, 00:04:50.206 --> 00:04:54.264 and we're even sharing our pets on DogVacay. 00:04:54.264 --> 00:04:58.719 Now welcome to the wonderful world of collaborative consumption 00:04:58.719 --> 00:05:01.940 that's enabling us to match wants with haves 00:05:01.940 --> 00:05:03.910 in more democratic ways. NOTE Paragraph 00:05:03.910 --> 00:05:07.580 Now, collaborative consumption is creating the start 00:05:07.580 --> 00:05:10.904 of a transformation in the way we think about supply and demand, 00:05:10.904 --> 00:05:14.815 but it's also a part of a massive value shift underway, 00:05:14.815 --> 00:05:18.005 where instead of consuming to keep up with the Joneses, 00:05:18.005 --> 00:05:21.557 people are consuming to get to know the Joneses. 00:05:21.557 --> 00:05:25.850 But the key reason why it's taking off now so fast 00:05:25.850 --> 00:05:28.884 is because every new advancement of technology 00:05:28.884 --> 00:05:32.958 increases the efficiency and the social glue of trust 00:05:32.958 --> 00:05:36.343 to make sharing easier and easier. NOTE Paragraph 00:05:36.343 --> 00:05:39.311 Now, I've looked at thousands of these marketplaces, 00:05:39.311 --> 00:05:44.023 and trust and efficiency are always the critical ingredients. 00:05:44.023 --> 00:05:46.015 Let me give you an example. 00:05:46.015 --> 00:05:50.433 Meet 46-year-old Chris Mok, who has, I bet, 00:05:50.433 --> 00:05:53.841 the best job title here of SuperRabbit. 00:05:53.841 --> 00:05:58.421 Now, four years ago, Chris lost his job, unfortunately, 00:05:58.421 --> 00:06:01.811 as an art buyer at Macy's, and like so many people, 00:06:01.811 --> 00:06:04.663 he struggled to find a new one during the recession. 00:06:04.663 --> 00:06:08.050 And then he happened to stumble across a post about 00:06:08.050 --> 00:06:09.514 TaskRabbit. NOTE Paragraph 00:06:09.514 --> 00:06:12.884 Now, the story behind TaskRabbit starts like so many 00:06:12.884 --> 00:06:16.971 great stories with a very cute dog by the name of Kobe. 00:06:16.971 --> 00:06:20.218 Now what happened was, in February 2008, 00:06:20.218 --> 00:06:22.882 Leah and her husband were waiting for a cab to take them 00:06:22.882 --> 00:06:26.323 out for dinner, when Kobe came trotting up to them 00:06:26.323 --> 00:06:28.683 and he was salivating with saliva. 00:06:28.683 --> 00:06:31.376 They realized they'd run out of dog food. 00:06:31.376 --> 00:06:34.620 Kevin had to cancel the cab and trudge out in the snow. 00:06:34.620 --> 00:06:37.934 Now, later that evening, the two self-confessed tech geeks 00:06:37.934 --> 00:06:41.723 starting talking about how cool it would be if some kind of 00:06:41.723 --> 00:06:43.763 eBay for errands existed. 00:06:43.763 --> 00:06:46.418 Six months later, Leah quit her job, 00:06:46.418 --> 00:06:49.007 and TaskRabbit was born. 00:06:49.007 --> 00:06:52.872 At the time, she didn't realize that she was actually hitting 00:06:52.872 --> 00:06:57.460 on a bigger idea she later called service networking. 00:06:57.460 --> 00:07:00.993 It's essentially about how we use our online relationships 00:07:00.993 --> 00:07:04.310 to get things done in the real world. NOTE Paragraph 00:07:04.310 --> 00:07:06.919 Now the way TaskRabbit works is, people outsource 00:07:06.919 --> 00:07:09.486 the tasks that they want doing, name the price 00:07:09.486 --> 00:07:12.125 they're willing to pay, and then vetted Rabbits 00:07:12.125 --> 00:07:13.658 bid to run the errand. 00:07:13.658 --> 00:07:18.151 Yes, there's actually a four-stage, rigorous interview process 00:07:18.151 --> 00:07:19.939 that's designed to find the people that would make 00:07:19.939 --> 00:07:23.597 great personal assistants and weed out the dodgy Rabbits. 00:07:23.597 --> 00:07:28.566 Now, there's over 4,000 Rabbits across the United States 00:07:28.566 --> 00:07:31.583 and 5,000 more on the waiting list. NOTE Paragraph 00:07:31.583 --> 00:07:34.350 Now the tasks being posted are things that you might 00:07:34.350 --> 00:07:37.711 expect, like help with household chores 00:07:37.711 --> 00:07:39.892 or doing some supermarket runs. 00:07:39.892 --> 00:07:42.734 I actually learned the other day that 12 and a half thousand 00:07:42.734 --> 00:07:45.757 loads of laundry have been cleaned and folded 00:07:45.757 --> 00:07:47.469 through TaskRabbit. 00:07:47.469 --> 00:07:51.281 But I love that the number one task posted, 00:07:51.281 --> 00:07:54.558 over a hundred times a day, is something that many of us 00:07:54.558 --> 00:07:57.126 have felt the pain of doing: 00:07:57.126 --> 00:08:03.586 yes, assembling Ikea furniture. (Laughter) (Applause) 00:08:03.586 --> 00:08:07.303 It's brilliant. Now, we may laugh, but Chris here 00:08:07.303 --> 00:08:09.903 is actually making up to 5,000 dollars a month 00:08:09.903 --> 00:08:13.054 running errands around his life. 00:08:13.054 --> 00:08:16.389 And 70 percent of this new labor force 00:08:16.389 --> 00:08:19.853 were previously unemployed or underemployed. 00:08:19.853 --> 00:08:23.247 I think TaskRabbit and other examples of collaborative consumption 00:08:23.247 --> 00:08:26.686 are like lemonade stands on steroids. They're just brilliant. NOTE Paragraph 00:08:26.686 --> 00:08:30.711 Now, when you think about it, it's amazing, right, 00:08:30.711 --> 00:08:33.910 that over the past 20 years, we've evolved 00:08:33.910 --> 00:08:37.422 from trusting people online to share information 00:08:37.422 --> 00:08:40.285 to trusting to handing over our credit card information, 00:08:40.285 --> 00:08:43.583 and now we're entering the third trust wave: 00:08:43.583 --> 00:08:47.311 connecting trustworthy strangers to create all kinds 00:08:47.311 --> 00:08:49.838 of people-powered marketplaces. 00:08:49.838 --> 00:08:51.553 I actually came across this fascinating study 00:08:51.553 --> 00:08:53.993 by the Pew Center this week that revealed 00:08:53.993 --> 00:08:57.525 that an active Facebook user is three times as likely 00:08:57.525 --> 00:09:02.560 as a non-Internet user to believe that most people are trustworthy. 00:09:02.560 --> 00:09:06.937 Virtual trust will transform the way we trust one another 00:09:06.937 --> 00:09:08.342 face to face. NOTE Paragraph 00:09:08.342 --> 00:09:11.637 Now, with all of my optimism, and I am an optimist, 00:09:11.637 --> 00:09:15.357 comes a healthy dose of caution, or rather, an urgent need 00:09:15.357 --> 00:09:19.798 to address some pressing, complex questions. 00:09:19.798 --> 00:09:22.384 How to ensure our digital identities reflect our 00:09:22.384 --> 00:09:25.847 real world identities? Do we want them to be the same? 00:09:25.847 --> 00:09:29.527 How do we mimic the way trust is built face-to-face online? 00:09:29.527 --> 00:09:31.410 How do we stop people who've behaved badly 00:09:31.410 --> 00:09:35.104 in one community doing so under a different guise? 00:09:35.104 --> 00:09:38.199 In a similar way that companies often use some kind of 00:09:38.199 --> 00:09:41.662 credit rating to decide whether to give you a mobile plan, 00:09:41.662 --> 00:09:44.710 or the rate of a mortgage, marketplaces that depend 00:09:44.710 --> 00:09:47.455 on transactions between relative strangers 00:09:47.455 --> 00:09:50.399 need some kind of device to let you know that Sebastian 00:09:50.399 --> 00:09:52.360 and Chris are good eggs, 00:09:52.360 --> 00:09:55.480 and that device is reputation. NOTE Paragraph 00:09:55.480 --> 00:10:00.478 Reputation is the measurement of how much a community trusts you. 00:10:00.478 --> 00:10:02.113 Let's just take a look at Chris. 00:10:02.113 --> 00:10:05.406 You can see that over 200 people have given him 00:10:05.406 --> 00:10:08.645 an average rating over 4.99 out of 5. 00:10:08.645 --> 00:10:10.925 There are over 20 pages of reviews of his work 00:10:10.925 --> 00:10:13.309 describing him as super-friendly and fast, 00:10:13.309 --> 00:10:17.031 and he's reached level 25, the highest level, 00:10:17.031 --> 00:10:18.988 making him a SuperRabbit. 00:10:18.988 --> 00:10:21.886 Now — (Laughter) -- I love that word, SuperRabbit. 00:10:21.886 --> 00:10:25.545 And interestingly, what Chris has noted is that as his reputation 00:10:25.545 --> 00:10:28.704 has gone up, so has his chances of winning a bid 00:10:28.704 --> 00:10:30.657 and how much he can charge. 00:10:30.657 --> 00:10:33.395 In other words, for SuperRabbits, reputation 00:10:33.395 --> 00:10:35.464 has a real world value. NOTE Paragraph 00:10:35.464 --> 00:10:37.500 Now, I know what you might be thinking. 00:10:37.500 --> 00:10:40.043 Well, this isn't anything new. Just think of power sellers 00:10:40.043 --> 00:10:43.599 on eBay or star ratings on Amazon. 00:10:43.599 --> 00:10:46.839 The difference today is that, with every trade we make, 00:10:46.839 --> 00:10:50.239 comment we leave, person we flag, badge we earn, 00:10:50.239 --> 00:10:52.181 we leave a reputation trail 00:10:52.181 --> 00:10:55.727 of how well we can and can't be trusted. 00:10:55.727 --> 00:10:58.312 And it's not just the breadth but the volume 00:10:58.312 --> 00:11:00.950 of reputation data out there that is staggering. 00:11:00.950 --> 00:11:04.254 Just consider this: Five million nights have been booked 00:11:04.254 --> 00:11:07.213 on Airbnb in the past six months alone. 00:11:07.213 --> 00:11:11.176 30 million rides have been shared on Carpooling.com. 00:11:11.176 --> 00:11:14.063 This year, two billion dollars worth of loans 00:11:14.063 --> 00:11:16.291 will go through peer-to-peer lending platforms. 00:11:16.291 --> 00:11:20.645 This adds up to millions of pieces of reputation data 00:11:20.645 --> 00:11:24.017 on how well we behave or misbehave. NOTE Paragraph 00:11:24.017 --> 00:11:27.606 Now, capturing and correlating the trails of information 00:11:27.606 --> 00:11:30.859 that we leave in different places is a massive challenge, 00:11:30.859 --> 00:11:33.461 but one we're being asked to figure out. 00:11:33.461 --> 00:11:36.745 What the likes of Sebastian are starting to rightfully ask 00:11:36.745 --> 00:11:39.710 is, shouldn't they own their reputation data? 00:11:39.710 --> 00:11:42.584 Shouldn't the reputation that he's personally invested 00:11:42.584 --> 00:11:45.991 on building on Airbnb mean that it should travel with him 00:11:45.991 --> 00:11:48.057 from one community to another? 00:11:48.057 --> 00:11:50.769 What I mean by this is, say he started selling second-hand 00:11:50.769 --> 00:11:54.525 books on Amazon. Why should he have to start from scratch? 00:11:54.525 --> 00:11:58.200 It's a bit like when I moved from New York to Sydney. 00:11:58.200 --> 00:12:01.388 It was ridiculous. I couldn't get a mobile phone plan 00:12:01.388 --> 00:12:05.191 because my credit history didn't travel with me. 00:12:05.191 --> 00:12:08.135 I was essentially a ghost in the system. NOTE Paragraph 00:12:08.135 --> 00:12:11.150 Now I'm not suggesting that the next stage 00:12:11.150 --> 00:12:13.046 of the reputation economy is about 00:12:13.046 --> 00:12:17.415 adding up multiple ratings into some kind of empty score. 00:12:17.415 --> 00:12:20.877 People's lives are too complex, and who wants to do that? 00:12:20.877 --> 00:12:23.324 I also want to be clear that this isn't about adding up 00:12:23.324 --> 00:12:26.925 tweets and likes and friends in a Klout-like fashion. 00:12:26.925 --> 00:12:30.205 Those guys are measuring influence, not behaviors 00:12:30.205 --> 00:12:32.092 that indicate our trustworthiness. NOTE Paragraph 00:12:32.092 --> 00:12:35.692 But the most important thing that we have to keep in mind 00:12:35.692 --> 00:12:39.633 is that reputation is largely contextual. 00:12:39.633 --> 00:12:42.367 Just because Sebastian is a wonderful host 00:12:42.367 --> 00:12:46.316 does not mean that he can assemble Ikea furniture. 00:12:46.316 --> 00:12:49.649 The big challenge is figuring out what data 00:12:49.649 --> 00:12:52.414 makes sense to pull, because the future's 00:12:52.414 --> 00:12:55.802 going to be driven by a smart aggregation of reputation, 00:12:55.802 --> 00:12:58.614 not a single algorithm. 00:12:58.614 --> 00:13:02.365 It's only a matter of time before we'll be able to perform 00:13:02.365 --> 00:13:04.764 a Facebook- or Google-like search 00:13:04.764 --> 00:13:07.686 and see a complete picture of someone's behaviors 00:13:07.686 --> 00:13:10.566 in different contexts over time. 00:13:10.566 --> 00:13:14.201 I envision a realtime stream of who has trusted you, 00:13:14.201 --> 00:13:18.356 when, where and why, your reliability on TaskRabbit, 00:13:18.356 --> 00:13:20.336 your cleanliness as a guest on Airbnb, 00:13:20.336 --> 00:13:23.784 the knowledge that you display on Quora or Tripovo, 00:13:23.784 --> 00:13:26.367 they'll all live together in one place, 00:13:26.367 --> 00:13:29.838 and this will live in some kind of reputation dashboard 00:13:29.838 --> 00:13:34.395 that will paint a picture of your reputation capital. NOTE Paragraph 00:13:34.395 --> 00:13:37.227 Now this is a concept that I'm currently researching 00:13:37.227 --> 00:13:39.809 and writing my next book on, and currently define 00:13:39.809 --> 00:13:43.584 as the worth of your reputation, your intentions, 00:13:43.584 --> 00:13:47.965 capabilities and values across communities and marketplaces. 00:13:47.965 --> 00:13:50.873 This isn't some far-off frontier. 00:13:50.873 --> 00:13:53.907 There are actually a wave of startups like Connect.Me 00:13:53.907 --> 00:13:57.410 and Legit and TrustCloud that are figuring out how 00:13:57.410 --> 00:14:02.393 you can aggregate, monitor and use your online reputation. NOTE Paragraph 00:14:02.393 --> 00:14:06.106 Now, I realize that this concept may sound a little 00:14:06.106 --> 00:14:09.672 Big Brother to some of you, and yes, there are some 00:14:09.672 --> 00:14:13.072 enormous transparency and privacy issues to solve, 00:14:13.072 --> 00:14:16.944 but ultimately, if we can collect our personal reputation, 00:14:16.944 --> 00:14:19.857 we can actually control it more, and extract 00:14:19.857 --> 00:14:22.577 the immense value that will flow from it. NOTE Paragraph 00:14:22.577 --> 00:14:25.308 Also, more so than our credit history, 00:14:25.308 --> 00:14:27.944 we can actually shape our reputation. 00:14:27.944 --> 00:14:29.263 Just think of Sebastian 00:14:29.263 --> 00:14:32.110 and how he bought the cat to influence his. NOTE Paragraph 00:14:32.110 --> 00:14:36.624 Now privacy issues aside, the other really interesting issue 00:14:36.624 --> 00:14:39.378 I'm looking at is how do we empower digital ghosts, 00:14:39.378 --> 00:14:42.774 people [who] for whatever reason, are not active online, 00:14:42.774 --> 00:14:45.538 but are some of the most trustworthy people in the world? 00:14:45.538 --> 00:14:48.954 How do we take their contributions to their jobs, 00:14:48.954 --> 00:14:50.958 their communities and their families, 00:14:50.958 --> 00:14:54.866 and convert that value into reputation capital? NOTE Paragraph 00:14:54.866 --> 00:14:58.650 Ultimately, when we get it right, reputation capital 00:14:58.650 --> 00:15:01.488 could create a massive positive disruption 00:15:01.488 --> 00:15:05.233 in who has power, trust and influence. 00:15:05.233 --> 00:15:08.873 A three-digit score, your traditional credit history, 00:15:08.873 --> 00:15:11.570 that only 30 percent of us actually know what it is, 00:15:11.570 --> 00:15:14.514 will no longer be the determining factor 00:15:14.514 --> 00:15:17.882 in how much things cost, what we can access, 00:15:17.882 --> 00:15:20.802 and, in many instances, limit what we can do in the world. 00:15:20.802 --> 00:15:25.210 Indeed, reputation is a currency that I believe will become 00:15:25.210 --> 00:15:30.457 more powerful than our credit history in the 21st century. 00:15:30.457 --> 00:15:33.154 Reputation will be the currency that says 00:15:33.154 --> 00:15:35.338 that you can trust me. NOTE Paragraph 00:15:35.338 --> 00:15:38.642 Now the interesting thing is, reputation 00:15:38.642 --> 00:15:40.653 is the socioeconomic lubricant 00:15:40.653 --> 00:15:45.451 that makes collaborative consumption work and scale, 00:15:45.451 --> 00:15:47.261 but the sources it will be generated from, 00:15:47.261 --> 00:15:51.746 and its applications, are far bigger than this space alone. 00:15:51.746 --> 00:15:54.685 Let me give you one example from the world of recruiting, 00:15:54.685 --> 00:15:58.739 where reputation data will make the résumé seem 00:15:58.739 --> 00:16:02.817 like an archaic relic of the past. NOTE Paragraph 00:16:02.817 --> 00:16:06.840 Four years ago, tech bloggers and entrepreneurs 00:16:06.840 --> 00:16:11.938 Joel Spolsky and Jeff Atwood, decided to start something 00:16:11.938 --> 00:16:14.482 called Stack Overflow. 00:16:14.482 --> 00:16:17.906 Now, Stack Overflow is basically a platform where 00:16:17.906 --> 00:16:20.424 experienced programmers can ask 00:16:20.424 --> 00:16:24.937 other good programmers highly detailed technical questions 00:16:24.937 --> 00:16:28.929 on things like tiny pixels and chrome extensions. 00:16:28.929 --> 00:16:32.825 This site receives five and a half thousand questions a day, 00:16:32.825 --> 00:16:36.424 and 80 percent of these receive accurate answers. 00:16:36.424 --> 00:16:39.474 Now users earn reputation in a whole range of ways, 00:16:39.474 --> 00:16:42.107 but it's basically by convincing their peers 00:16:42.107 --> 00:16:44.481 they know what they're talking about. NOTE Paragraph 00:16:44.481 --> 00:16:47.258 Now a few months after this site launched, the founders 00:16:47.258 --> 00:16:49.680 heard about something interesting, 00:16:49.680 --> 00:16:51.363 and it actually didn't surprise them. 00:16:51.363 --> 00:16:54.951 What they heard was that users were putting 00:16:54.951 --> 00:16:58.395 their reputation scores on the top of their résumés, 00:16:58.395 --> 00:17:01.204 and that recruiters were searching the platform 00:17:01.204 --> 00:17:03.450 to find people with unique talents. 00:17:03.450 --> 00:17:06.357 Now thousands of programmers today are finding 00:17:06.357 --> 00:17:09.744 better jobs this way, because Stack Overflow 00:17:09.744 --> 00:17:12.965 and the reputation dashboards provide a priceless window 00:17:12.965 --> 00:17:15.660 into how someone really behaves, 00:17:15.660 --> 00:17:17.980 and what their peers think of them. NOTE Paragraph 00:17:17.980 --> 00:17:20.484 But the bigger principle of what's happening behind Stack Overflow, 00:17:20.484 --> 00:17:23.031 I think, is incredibly exciting. 00:17:23.031 --> 00:17:26.325 People are starting to realize that the reputation 00:17:26.325 --> 00:17:29.501 they generate in one place has value 00:17:29.501 --> 00:17:32.395 beyond the environments from which it was built. 00:17:32.395 --> 00:17:34.431 You know, it's very interesting. 00:17:34.431 --> 00:17:37.480 When you talk to super-users, whether that's SuperRabbits 00:17:37.480 --> 00:17:41.954 or super-people on Stack Overflow, or Uberhosts, 00:17:41.954 --> 00:17:45.001 they all talk about how having a high reputation 00:17:45.001 --> 00:17:48.316 unlocks a sense of their own power. 00:17:48.316 --> 00:17:51.242 On Stack Overflow, it creates a level playing field, 00:17:51.242 --> 00:17:54.169 enabling the people with the real talent to rise to the top. 00:17:54.169 --> 00:17:57.321 On Airbnb, the people often become more important 00:17:57.321 --> 00:17:59.914 than the spaces. On TaskRabbit, 00:17:59.914 --> 00:18:03.107 it gives people control of their economic activity. NOTE Paragraph 00:18:03.107 --> 00:18:06.440 Now at the end of my tea with Sebastian, he told me how, 00:18:06.440 --> 00:18:10.081 on a bad, rainy day, when he hasn't had a customer 00:18:10.081 --> 00:18:13.307 in his bookstore, he thinks of all the people around 00:18:13.307 --> 00:18:16.145 the world who've said something wonderful about him, 00:18:16.145 --> 00:18:18.816 and what that says about him as a person. 00:18:18.816 --> 00:18:22.264 He's turning 50 this year, and he's convinced 00:18:22.264 --> 00:18:25.872 that the rich tapestry of reputation he's built on Airbnb 00:18:25.872 --> 00:18:28.623 will lead him to doing something interesting 00:18:28.623 --> 00:18:31.180 with the rest of his life. NOTE Paragraph 00:18:31.180 --> 00:18:35.160 You know, there are only a few windows in history 00:18:35.160 --> 00:18:38.384 where the opportunity exists to reinvent 00:18:38.384 --> 00:18:41.719 part of how our socioeconomic system works. 00:18:41.719 --> 00:18:44.184 We're living through one of those moments. 00:18:44.184 --> 00:18:47.815 I believe that we are at the start of a collaborative revolution 00:18:47.815 --> 00:18:51.595 that will be as significant as the Industrial Revolution. 00:18:51.595 --> 00:18:55.204 In the 20th century, the invention of traditional credit 00:18:55.204 --> 00:18:58.448 transformed our consumer system, and in many ways 00:18:58.448 --> 00:19:01.233 controlled who had access to what. 00:19:01.233 --> 00:19:04.248 In the 21st century, new trust networks, 00:19:04.248 --> 00:19:07.622 and the reputation capital they generate, will reinvent 00:19:07.622 --> 00:19:11.888 the way we think about wealth, markets, power 00:19:11.888 --> 00:19:16.472 and personal identity, in ways we can't yet even imagine. 00:19:16.472 --> 00:19:19.439 Thank you very much. (Applause) 00:19:19.439 --> 00:19:24.930 (Applause)