Every month or so I am approached by someone wanting to start a new business. Mostly these ideas are interesting and even sensible. On rare occasions, however, they can seem slightly deranged — a website that lets you customise your own wheelie bin, that kind of thing. The pitches for these ideas usually end with the claim that there’s ‘a big gap in the market’.
When you’re told there’s ‘a gap in the market’, there is of course a simple riposte: ‘Yes, but is there a market in the gap?’ After all, markets are always full of gaps, for the simple reason that, even in the internet age, there are plenty of conceivable things nobody on earth will ever willingly pay for. I find myself asking, ‘Is there a market in the gap?’ when I read about the post-bureaucratic age or other ideas that seek to encourage voluntary collective action.
When you look at the way people spend their money, there does seem to be a gap — for while individual consumer spending, state expenditure and charitable giving all account for billions, there seems to be no outlet for collective self-interest.
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