Is the free market the Wikipedia of valuation?

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Something popped into my head while thinking about the Reliability of Wikipedia thread: in the free market, the values of goods and services are determined by consensus. This seems to me to be very close to how some people in the thread are characterizing Wikipedia, though with knowledge defined by consensus rather than value.

Is this a fair description of the market?

Is this a fair description of Wikipedia?

If so, should the market be rejected as a "proper" pricing mechanism in the same way that Wikipedia is rejected as a "proper" source of knowledge?

 

[Wandered Off]

Value is subjective and relative to supply, demand, geographical considerations, some localized conditions, and so on, so consensus is the best available mechanism, IMO.

 

[Mathematician]

In my opinion value mostly follows the subjective interpretation of labor required to get you the consumer whatever product and/or service you want, with a variable set by demand. For example, you can mine the exact same type of coal in Australia as you would Britain, but Britain imports most of its coal from Australia due to its location right beneath the toipsoil. Companies know it's so much cheaper to just have minor mine work in Australia and transport the findings than actually bringing out the heavy equipment and labor involved. Likewise, if diamonds were easily recoverable from every garden in America, they would lose most of their value.

Is this a fair description of Wikipedia?

I think of Wikipedia just as a peer-evaluation tool. Remember in a market you can 40% agreeing with one type of food stuff, and 60% with another (preferably there are more ten groups, though).