A digital gift is any gift consisting of information, shared by the giver with the recipient by means of digital communication technology. Examples include the sharing of media on the internet, or the open source movement's giving away of software.
The advent of digital gifts raises philosophical issues: for example, material gifts imply the loss of the given object by the giver, and thereby a sense of sacrifice. Digital gifts, by contrast, are copied. Booth, noting that in traditional gift economies, the sacrifice of a gift is made in the assumption of receiving a gift back at some later time, asks whether or not a digital gift can still be called a gift. He answers the question by calling the digital gift "a gift without an obligation to reciprocate": instead of a gift back, the giver expects a reply, an acknowledgment, meaning that the digital gift has the same bonding effect as the material gift.
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