House in San FranciscoThe 'sharing economy' — with the help of websites and apps — is displacing some of those corporations and getting us back to our roots.Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
Call it the sharing economy, call it peer-to-peer commerce, call it collaborative consumption, but no matter what you call it, it's having a massive impact on how we do business and disrupting established industries at a breakneck pace.
I'm talking about the renaissance of people doing business with people — instead of giant companies — a movement facilitated by an ever-growing array of marketplaces and apps.
If we think back in time 200 years, almost all commerce was peer-to-peer, right? We traded in small town squares and knew our neighbors. Then big corporations came in and took over the world.
The "sharing economy" — with the help of websites and apps — is displacing some of those corporations and getting us back to our roots. The premise is we have underutilized assets in our lives, and we can sell or rent those assets to our neighbors in win-win transactions.
Want your piece of the pie? Here's how you can get in on the action.

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