Maker Faire: making for the sake of making (…and a story about $2 bills)
It’s incredibly strange that Maker Faire HASN’T been in NYC before. With a table connected to Alpha1Labs, we finally got to meet more makers than we knew existed in New York. I hope it happens again, and for more than a weekend.
One person I met on the subway back tipped a musician with a $2 bill. I said, “Wow, that’s worth a lot more than two dollars.” And he goes, “no, I get all my money in $2 denominations.” He then proved it by showing me the contents of his wallet.
It turns out that $2 bills ARE in circulation, but most people think that they are antiques with uncertain value. I want to use $2 bills from now on. As both a medium of exchange and a conversation starter, reactions to $2 bills reveal a basic requirement of money: collective trust. What else could be collectively trusted? What other things might be reliably valuable for artists, designers, and craftspeople? I’d bet on web design over a $2 bill.
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OurGoods is a community of artists, designers, and cultural producers who want to barter skills, spaces, and objects.
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