The Infinite Value of Time With Others
The Network Effect of Time and Money. Hint: Best when shared with others
Something is as good as who you get to share it with.
So here is the important question, Spotify or Apple Music?
Recently, I saw a tweet listing all of the reasons why Apple Music was better than Spotify and to me, it made sense.
Apple Music is cheaper
Better sound quality
Integrates with the default iPhone music app
Give you weekly and monthly listening stats in addition to the yearly recap (Essentially, Spotify Wrapped on steroids)
But it didn’t move me to even slightly consider ditching Spotify for Apple Music.
Everyone I know has Spotify. You are the black sheep if you have Apple Music. It is in the same camp as having an Android. Just like you better not have green text messages, you better not have Apple Music.
Some of the better features of Apple Music were definitely important, but it missed the mark on one huge thing and the reason I keep coming back to Spotify.
The Network Effect.
The Network Effect is perhaps one of the strongest forces today. It is why Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok continue to succeed. It is why Snapchat still hangs on by a thread despite having some of the worst notifications known to man. I rarely use Snapchat, I keep it solely for the memories, but they still send me the same notification, five times a day, of someone posting a story. It is why Spotify continues to reign supreme and why Threads couldn’t unseat Twitter. We want to be where the action is. We crave connection, and we crave involvement.
This is the idea that things are only so good if we have someone to share it with. Something gains value if others have it too. The more people, the better.
This is why I find the Financial Independence Retire Early (FIRE) movement interesting. It is built on the premise of racing to retirement through your young years, working long hours to do so, and retiring by the age of 40. The goal of the movement is to have the freedom to set your own schedule, report to no one, use your time as you please, and make your own choices. It breaks you free of the one thing you don’t want - someone else having too much control over your time.
But, inevitably, it misses the mark. Your friends, most of your family, and social circle will not be retired at 40. You may have sole custody over your time, which is great, but it doesn’t matter if you have no one to share that time with. The FIRE folks may also have more money than their peers but for a lot of things, money is also a “network good”. It derives value from how many people around us also have access to it.
If you partake in the FIRE movement, you might have the opportunity to take 2 weeks off work, go to Thailand, ride on elephants, scooter up the mountains, and zipline in the forests without a worry in the world. Not only do you have time, you have money. But this misses the mark because it is about how many others around you can do the same thing. Similar to the reason we love the popular social media sites. They get their value from others being on there, this is no different.
If other people can’t afford the flight, accommodations, excursions, or dedicate the time to the fun in Thailand, it loses some of its appeal. Time alone is great, and I have solo traveled myself, but that is good until a point. We will eventually want to experience the moments with others. We are human beings and we need to connect with other human beings to make us whole.
It has to be synchronized, to some degree, with those around you.
There is also another side to this where people say that the highest form of wealth is the ability to wake up in the morning and do as you please. It is about having control over your time. I would mostly agree, but I have found we should not seek 100% of our time to be free of any restrictions. The same can be said for money. People desire to have a level of money that allows them to live as they please. We want no roadblocks, no barriers, and no restrictions placed by money on what we can reasonably do in life.
But sometimes, restrictions on time and money aren’t as bad as they are made out to be. There is freedom in being able to participate in collaborative experiences that take away the sole control of your time. You can make commitments that reward you with community by joining a sand volleyball league, adhering to a gym schedule, or participating with a religious organization. There is something to the truth that all time doesn’t need to be your own and shared time with others can increase the value of it.
If we have friends and we are in the same income range that is not a bad thing. It can be advantageous. We may not have the salary we ultimately desire, but if we are the same relative to those around us, some of the need to make more money temporarily disappears. Instead, the value of money we have intrinsically increases.
Money can increase in value just by being shared with those around us.
I went to Europe last summer with five friends. We had a great time traveling across the continent, going to beaches, clubs, historic sites, good restaurants, etc. This wasn’t a luxurious trip in the slightest. We flew budget airlines, stayed in hostels with strangers, and packed light. We were all relatively fresh out of college, and not flush with cash.
However, the lack of money didn’t restrict the trip. We all could afford what we desired to do but the value of our money increased because it was helped by the network effect. We were booking cheap thrills but these were much more than cheap, thanks to being with each other.
This is partly why college works on a “broke college kid” mindset. Everyone in college is “broke” to some degree. It is completely normal to eat ham and turkey sandwiches at every meal, buy the cheapest alcohol you can find, and fully take advantage of budget airlines when traveling. You have others going through the same experience with you so the lack of money is not always apparent. Instead, the money you do have is taken much farther. A $70 spirit airline flight to Las Vegas never felt so stylish thanks to having all your friends aboard the same flight.
It is not always a race to the top to earn the most and have the most control over our time. That is going against the waves of life. Sometimes we have to let the waves of life with our time and money flow. Realizing that it isn’t always about how much we have or how much control it gives us but rather, how and who we get to spend it with.
Appreciate you reading. If you enjoyed, please share or tap the like button.
-Scantron
Interesting post!
It reminded me of a conversation with someone in his 30s a few years back who wanted to make money and retire by 40. I asked him what he thinks he would do once you retire. He said I would travel with my wife, and then I asked how much. He said all the time. I said for how long? He could not able to answer that question. I told him what my father said to me several years back. We need a purpose to wake up in the morning, and travel can be a purpose, but we cannot do it for 20 years, so we need to find a few other things to occupy ourselves. Work gives most people a reason to wake up and do something even though we do not have complete control over our time.
I think we need to live some and have fun, including when we are young and have very little money. Working long hours for 20 years with only focus on saving money and thinking I will do most of the fun things after I retire is not a good way of living as we never know what life has stored for us once we retire.
However, everyone needs to decide what makes them happy; for some, the above lifestyle may be proper.