[Nettime-bold] RE: <nettime> Ruins of a new economy

["Jon Lebkowsky" <jonl@well.com>]

> From: nettime-l-request@bbs.thing.net
> [mailto:nettime-l-request@bbs.thing.net]On Behalf Of Steve Cisler
> Sent: Saturday, May 12, 2001 7:49 AM
> To: nettime-l@bbs.thing.net
> Subject: <nettime> Ruins of a new economy
>
>
> To the organizers of Tulipomania in Amsterdam: pat yourself on the back
> but don't dislocate your shoulder.
>
> Steve
> ---
>
> May 13, 2001 New York Times Magazine
>
> The Peculiar Ruins of the New Economy
>
> Photograph by RICHARD BARNES Text by DAVID BROOKS

Steve et al,

I'd read this bit of fluff already, and I don't have much to add to
Tiffany's conclusions. Only, perhaps, that the whacky boomtown new-economy
manic phase did churn enough investment to fuel innovations that might
otherwise have taken much longer to evolve.

The real problem with the 'new economy,' IMO, had nothing to do with the
technology, which is clearly a boon and here to stay. The problem with the
'new economy' is nothing new: it's the same downsides of capitalism that
nettimers know so well: greed and avarice. I argued here some weeks ago
capitalism (corporations) are just a form of organization, that greed is not
inherent but the product of a failure to instill any sense of ethics in our
legions of fresh-scrubbed MBAs, the same folks who siezed the Internet as
their own and called it an "industry."

Manic growth is never sustainable, and it's a relief to see this latest
bubble burst (anyone who's lived in a boomtown won't be surprised to see
this side of the cycle). The question now is how we evolve an ethical
tradition so that whatever form our future may take, we learn to be more
humane and to think in terms of sustainability. The real new economy should
be founded on an ethics of economic justice, which is antithetical to the
net-boom focus on growth at all costs.

(We have an uphill battle, of course, given the politics of the current
executive administration of the U.S.)

best,
Jon L.


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