Is This Real Life?

As I consider the thoughts of Ghosh in his article about the Cooking Pot, I ask myself "Is this real life?" When it comes to an online economy, different people make the same observation as the one found in Ghosh's article, "Many things found on the Net, though, can be found off it." So which is the primary product? Is it the one that is sold online, or is the one in the world of the physical. Do they both exist? Or are we going to eventually live our lives through online Surrogates. There are so many aspects of an online economy that seem a little strange to me.  Ghosh talks about the online use of value and not money, but isn't the concept of money just value associated with a piece of paper from a specific producer?

The consideration of posts, comments, likes, and shares as economic transactions is an interesting way to approach the purpose of the internet in an economic sense where people participate in order to contribute to discussions, meet people, and share ideas. Ghosh is, in affect, claiming that the internet is a knowledge economy, and "in a knowledge economy, every exchange of knowledge in any form is an act of trade." I understand his point and believe that the major difference between online and offline interactions of this sort lies in the duration that information exchange can last, as well as the accessibility to it by others. This brings up the consideration of value. Just because the information is available to people for free doesn't mean that it doesn't have value. However, in like manner, just because information is taking up space on the internet doesn't mean that it's valuable. How, in a market of infinite size, can we provide quality/value control for the information and economic transactions of an online world?