Meeting notice: The 02-02-99 meeting will be held at
7:30 p.m. at the Royal East (782 Main St., Cambridge),
a block down from the corner of Main St. and Mass Ave.
                         
-- This is being sent out early and in a rush because
-- I have to be in St. Petersburg (Russia) by this time
-- tomorrow.  Details at 11.  And at the 02-16 meeting.

Suggested Topic: What consumption model is right for
NT?

The "normal" extropianish vision of the nanotech
society is based on a straight line extrapolation
of standard American consumerism.  No matter how
vast an increase in the productive powers of the society
the technology delivers, it will be but a speck set
against the powers of increase built (by the genes?)
into the bottomless elasticity of the acquisitive
impulse. In a line: the more there is, the more there
is to buy.  

However, there are two other consumption models that
ought to be considered: the old money model and the
senior citizen model.  The old money model is expressed
by a handful of citizens in this region who live in
the family house, or maybe the family island, and
wear everything to pieces.  They drive WWII jeeps
and wear their grandfather's tuxedo and eat oatmeal.
They don't consume anything that hasn't been sanctified
by contact with the family tradition.  When they buy
they buy from the merchants their fathers bought from,
if at all possible.  They are cheap and pretend to be
even cheaper.

The senior citizen model is more prevelant.  Every
marketeer knows that once people get any distance into
their 50's purchasing behavior tanks.  One
interpretation of this is that seniors are saving for
their retirement.  No doubt there is something to that,
but I think it is also true that you can only
participate in just so many product cycles before the
thrill is gone.  You get good enough with the tools you
have that starting back at zero with a new set loses
its attraction.

It seems plausible to me that nanotech, which is going
to be associated with long lives and the kinds of
communication tools that will allow extended families
to live in each other's worlds, at least virtually,
might stimulate either or both of these consumption
models.  If so, the deflation effect accompanying
the transition could be quite severe.

Comments?

                              
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