Thoughts on 'Free' by Chris Anderson

I have read this book as part of my research for the programme I am taking part in, called Radio Revisited. You can read some more about the reasons for this and what Radio Revisited aims to do on the Vision and Media blog.

There is no doubt that the work is changing and the reduction of digital storage and delivery to an almost un-metered price means a change in what can be charged for and what will become 'free'. Chris Anderson in his previous book The Long Tail showed how cheaper and cheaper digital storage means digital stores can hold a huge inventory and still make money from selling just a couple of units from their many lines.

Atoms v bits
Now in Free, Chris compares anything that is made of 'atoms' as something that has value and can be traded for real money and anything that is made up of 'bits' is perceived as not worth spending money on.  But my problem is that anything I make, as a sound designer, is in 'bits' and so how do I make a living in this 'atoms v bits' world? What I have is intellectual property (IP). So my challenge is to monetize my IP and how to go about making money around 'free'?

Anderson outlines that to compete with 'free' you have to produce something better, or at least different from the 'free' alternatives and quotes examples like people passing the free office coffee machine to go to Starbucks to buy a coffee there. Or in the digital world he compares Microsoft Office with the open source 'office' equivalents, where if you want a relatively reliable product with customer service you buy Microsoft. If you want a 'free' product and can put up with it not being as reliable and can spend the time hunting on the net for the fix, then the open source option offers a low cost solution. Also if what you are doing is being replaced by software and/or 'on line', like travel agents, real estate agents, or stockbrokers then you need to move upstream to use your IP to resolve the more complex problems which people will still pay for.

Journalism
The newspaper industry is being decimated in this 'information free' world. So journalists need to adapt to survive. The top tier newspapers will survive but most journalists aren't employed by them. They work in the 101 magazines and trade journals, local papers etc. The journalists that are prepared to adapt will need to move upstream and become editors and gatekeepers of the information overloaded world of the internet. They also need to become coaches and editors to the growing amateur journalists, bloggers etc.

So it is looking as if the phrase 'time is money' is looking less and less secure....

If you are interested in buying the book then please consider using the links below.