Read by David Cochran Heath

In The Zero Marginal Cost Society, New York Times bestselling author Jeremy Rifkin argues that the capitalist era is passing-not quickly, but inevitably. The emerging Internet of Things is giving rise to a new economic system that will transform our way of life. In this provocative new book, Rifkin argues that the coming together of the Communication Internet with the fledgling Energy Internet and Logistics Internet in a seamless twenty-first-century intelligent infrastructure-the Internet of Things-is boosting productivity to the point where the marginal cost of producing many goods and services is nearly zero, making them essentially free. The result is that corporate profits are beginning to dry up, property rights are weakening, and the conventional mind-set of scarcity is slowly giving way to the possibility of abundance. The zero marginal cost phenomenon is spawning a hybrid economy-part capitalist market and part "collaborative commons"-with far-reaching implications for society. Rifkin describes how hundreds of millions of people are already transferring parts of their economic lives from capitalist markets to what he calls the global Collaborative Commons. "Prosumers" are making and sharing their own information, entertainment, green energy, and 3-D printed products at near zero marginal cost. They are also sharing cars, homes, clothes, and other items via social media sites, redistribution clubs, and cooperatives at low or near zero marginal cost. Students are even enrolling in free MOOCs, massive open online courses that operate at near zero marginal cost. And young social entrepreneurs are establishing ecologically sensitive businesses using crowdfunding as well as creating alternative currencies in the new sharing economy. In this new world, social capital is as important as financial capital, access trumps ownership, cooperation supersedes competition, and "exchange value" in the capitalist marketplace is increasingly replaced by "sharable value" on the Collaborative Commons. Rifkin concludes that while capitalism will be with us for the foreseeable future, albeit in an increasingly diminished role, it will not be the dominant economic paradigm by the second half of the twenty-first century. We are, Rifkin says, entering a world beyond markets, where we are learning how to live together in an increasingly interdependent global Collaborative Commons. Title Info. Chapter 1. The Great Paradigm Shift from Market Capitalism to the Collaborative Commons Part One: The Untold History of Capitalism. Chapter 2. The European Enclosures and the Birth of the Market Economy Chapter 3. The Courtship of Capitalism and Vertical Integration Chapter 4. Human Nature through a Capitalist Lens Part Two: The Near Zero Marginal Cost Society. Chapter 5. Extreme Productivity, the Internet of Things, and Free Energy Chapter 6. 3D Printing: From Mass Production to Production by the Masses Chapter 7. MOOCs and a Zero Marginal Cost Education Chapter 8. The Last Worker Standing Chapter 9. The Ascent of the Prosumer and the Build-Out of the Smart Economy Part Three: The Rise of the Collaborative Commons. Chapter 10. The Comedy of the Commons Chapter 11. The Collaboratists Prepare for Battle Chapter 12. The Struggle to Define and Control the Intelligent Infrastructure Part Four: Social Capital and the Sharing Economy. Chapter 13. The Transformation from Ownership to Access Chapter 14. Crowdfunding Social Capital, Democratizing Currency, Humanizing Entrepreneurship, and Rethinking Work Part Five: The Economy of Abundance. Chapter 15. The Sustainable Cornucopia Chapter 16. A Biosphere Lifestyle Afterword: A Personal Note "This is a thought-provoking read that pushes some of the most important new technologies to their logical-and sometimes scary-conclusions." "The Zero Marginal Cost Society is admirable in its scope. Rifkin offers a wide-ranging overview of the kind of tech advances that will r

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