Life breaks free, it expands to new territories and crashes through barriers, painfully, maybe even dangerously, but … life … finds a way.

Not long afterward, dinosaurs that were bred to be sterile start reproducing and running amok.

There are plenty of examples of how life finds a way, not only in nature and in Hollywood blockbusters but in a host of recent market innovators who have found a way to circumvent legally privileged and special-interest groups. Many of these developments fall into what people refer to as the sharing economy, which harnesses the power of the Internet and includes businesses like Airbnb, Uber, and Kickstarter.

First, Some Basics

Each of us has preferences — narrowly selfish, other-regarding, or something in between — that we seek to satisfy with the resources at hand.