I was working on some other pieces referring to the loss of the commons, when the concept of the tragedy of the commons was explained to me, Wikipedia explains it as …

The tragedy of the commons is the concept which states that if many people enjoy unfettered access to a finite, valuable resource such as a pasture, they will tend to overuse it and may end up destroying its value altogether. Even if some users exercised voluntary restraint, the other users would merely supplant them, the predictable result being a tragedy for all.