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The Zero Marginal Cost Society

Jeremy Rifkin argued in his 2014 book "The Zero Marginal Cost Society" that a new economic system emerging after capitalism and socialism should be taken seriously. Marginal cost refers to the cost of producing one additional unit of a good or service after the fixed costs have been recovered. Today, a decade later, people are exchanging voice and video calls, text messages, and other content via their phones and computers at near-zero marginal cost and creating value in the process, proving Rifkin's theory. Based on this theory, Holders' KTK project is confident that metaverse will be utilized in the next economic system. Participating in this virtual reality world will be an essential element for a foundation on which people can live without worrying about the cost in their real lives.

According to the author, there are three key elements of economic laws: communication, energy, and transportation. For instance, the first Industrial Revolution in the 19th century experienced an explosive response through the combination of steam power as a means of transportation and communication methods such as printing and telegraphy, in addition to the existing coal energy. In the 20th century, the focus shifted to petroleum, telephone and television communication, and internal combustion engines. However, with the development of the internet, the traditional market economy approach of constantly developing new technologies, increasing productivity, reducing marginal costs, and lowering prices to improve market share is breaking down as it reaches the zero marginal cost society. In this society, creating valuable products or services becomes virtually free, and the market exchange economy's conventional wisdom of price formation is being challenged.

For instance, the internet has rendered traditional newspapers, magazines, and publishing almost meaningless, making the sharing of valuable information essentially costless. In other words, consumers have become "prosumers," both producers and consumers simultaneously. Initially, experts attempted to apply a positive spin to the notion of information being provided and shared for free. For example, some articles from The New York Times could be accessed for free, but the idea was to transition to a paid service. However, this transition never fully materialized because there are almost limitless free services available, effectively making the service free.

In today's world, everything that moves is being digitized, making it accessible to everyone. With mobile technology, anyone can analyze and process big data to create their own algorithms. Although companies like Apple, Google, Facebook, and Meta have an advantage, opportunities are open fairly to everyone. The service provided by ChatGPT is a product of this phenomenon, and it has contributed to accelerating this trend. In the era of the Internet of Things, data flow generates economic value, and individuals, small businesses, and countries can access it equally in a neutral internet.

Our team believes that the current metaverse being observed is currently in the fourth stage, which is the enlightenment stage, after passing through the first stage of technology acceleration, the second stage of peak expectation, and the third stage of disillusionment. The XR (extended reality) currently being developed by major players such as Samsung, Qualcomm, and Apple has shown remarkable results in the fields of medicine and education. The foundation is confident that the technological advancement connecting the real world and the metaverse will soon be achieved, and is therefore taking incremental steps towards what can be done at present.