Lessig and the Grindr Economy

IKEA Effect: I made a *slight* modification to the Grindr logo ALL BY MYSELF.

Copyright law has never seemed so interesting and relevant. Thanks, Lessig. In Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy, Lawrence Lessig ultimately argues that copyright, as it currently stands, must be reformed. He portrays it as an archaic form of the law that no longer makes sense (questioning it ever did) in today’s digital climate, hindering both creativity and the economy more broadly.

In analyzing current copyright laws, Lessig identifies an important distinction between two forms of economic trade. There are commercial economies—the ones my mind immediately goes to—in which “money or ‘price’ is a central term of the ordinary, or normal, exchange,” i.e. those transactions in which monetary exchange is expected. I’ll pay you this much for that. In juxtaposition with this form of trade are sharing economies. According to Lessig, “Of all the possible terms of exchange within a sharing economy, the single term that isn’t appropriate is money.” He gives the example of a friendship to illustrate this idea, saying that there are certain expectations that you can have of a friend (“Spend more time with me!”), but the second you demand money in exchange for your friendship, “the relationship is no longer a friendship.”

Completely inappropriate

Lessig goes on to emphasize the polarity here: “Money in the sharing economy is not just inappropriate; it is poisonous. And ‘helping out’ is not just rare in a commercial economy. It is downright weird.” The difference all comes down to the importance of monetary exchange (either its expectation or its exclusion): “Commercial economies build value with money at their core. Sharing economies build value, ignoring money.”

In this post, I set out to portray two “ sharing economies” that have become important to me in my academic pursuits, but in the process, I realized that even these examples have elements that cause them to drift into a more nuanced, hybrid state—a very move that Lessig predicts and encourages.

I was weighing different communities to think about my own experience within a sharing economy, and although I was at first thinking of looking at more of an academic commons, I decided I’d use this post to think about one of the social apps that might factor into my final project: Grindr.

According to its website, Grindr is “the world’ largest social networking app for gay, bi, trans, and queer people.” Launched in 2009 by Joel Simkhai, the app was originally conceived as a place for queer folks (although users have mostly turned out to be gay men) to meet and chat with other locals. Since then, the app has continued to expand and gain popularity, even giving rise to the media site Into, pitched as a millennial response to Out magazine.

Sourced from Grindr website

An image from the Grindr website illustrates the app’s interface. Profiles uploaded by users are displayed in relation to their distance from the phone accessing the app. As a sharing economy, the app is free to users and its value is also directly dependent upon them. If no one is using the app, no profiles appear. As with many dating apps, value is added with each additional user who puts in the effort to curate his (or her) profile.

Profiles list a number of fields that users can choose to fill in or leave blank, including options for display name, age, body type, preferred sexual position, ethnicity, relationship status, and tribe. Typically, the more fields that a user fills in, the more interactions they’ll find themselves engaging in with other users.

This also works for Grindr, however, as this information allows them to turn this sharing economy into a hybrid one. According to Lessig, a hybrid economy is “either a commercial entity that aims to leverage value from a sharing economy, or it is a sharing economy that builds a commercial entity to better support its sharing aims.” In the case of Grindr, we find an example of the latter entity. Not only does Grindr gain money through advertising on their app, they also offer their users premium accounts for a monthly fee. These premium accounts give users certain privileges including the ability to sift through other profiles based off of the fields listed above.

Yet, as Lessig points out, these hybrid economies only work if they still maintain at least the appearance of either a sharing economy or a commercial one. In this case, the (arguably) sparse use of advertising and the default option of using a free account allow Grindr to be viewed as a sharing economy.

Image sourced from Galoremag.com

A curious aspect of Grindr, however, is that the most intrusive interferences to its sharing economy aren’t effected by the app developers, but rather by the users themselves. Although its certainly not the norm, it’s not entirely uncommon to be propositioned for sex in exchange for money. And, on the flip side, some users even state in their bios that they’re looking for “generous” partners. This exchange is sometimes masked under other names (like “erotic massages,” as seen in the image to the right—a screenshot of a Grindr conversation). While this may be an effective method for some, it simply does not fit with the expectation of users functioning within  a sharing economy (or a hybrid economy that passes as a sharing one), and the effect is often jarring.

Lessig, however, believes (and even welcomes) this future of increasingly hybridized economies. Noting that this shift will be a “radical” one, how it will impact (and already has impacted) Grindr along with other social apps is something I’m curious to explore.

What hybridized elements have you observed in social/dating/hookup apps?