Free, by Chris Anderson

I've been thinking a lot about free software, because I think that is where the industry is inevitably headed, so I figured I should read the written authority on the matter, Chris Anderson's Free.

The basic premise: the problem of the future, particularly with digital goods, is abundance not scarcity. Because I already believed, I'm actually not sure how convincing he was. I was totally convinced, of course.

Basic economics takes a hit. No more even, upward sloping demand curves. Instead, it's zero demand until a certain point your product becomes valuable enough, and then everyone wants it. Thus, the free economy frequently yields near-monopolies by its nature.

Getting people's attention in a wasteland of abundance is the main challenge, and then just make sure you have a good free business strategy. The book offers a full list of them. Yahoo's response to the Gmail threat provides a great example in the software world. Yahoo successfully combated Gmail's free gigabytes with free unlimited storage.

One thing completely confounded me. Here's what he writes about books:

For nonfiction books, especially those on business topics, free books are often more closely modeled after free music. The low-marginal-cost digital book is really just the marketing for the high-marginal-cost speech or consulting gig.... (Yes, that's my model, too. Speakers Bureau details are on my Web site!)

Given that, where's the free version of this book online? Not to be found. Sure, they posted an audio version here, but the recordings are abridged, and I still think that's a cop-out.

So, free is the future, but it's not here yet. Yup, that sounds like where we are.

Media is software, software is media

Much attention has been given to how media is getting killed trying to make the leap to the digital age.

Newspapers are literally dying while they search for an online business model. Magazines are being replaced by blogs. Craigslist destroyed the classified ad industry. Kindle is the most successful attempt so far to update the book, but it's hardly mainstream. (My dad said he never heard of it.) Movie theaters don't make any money unless you buy a popcorn.

Meanwhile, we have had occasional public discussion about whether software is speech, as these other forms of media are. Often, digital rights sit in the middle of these discussions, as some company invokes the DCMA to stop a coder.

But, I recently noticed something that made me realize that software, particularly games, are even closer to traditional media than I thought.

At the bookstore, I started seeing many books that originated from computer games. These include everything from long, intricate novels to comics. Apparently, this has been going on for a while, but it's reaching a point of mainstream acceptance, which is why I finally noticed it.

Of course, good games have always told stories. I can remember some of my Civilization empires as clearly as some movies. Games are increasingly described today as "prequels" or "sequels", and not just in the sense of having newer features, but literal extensions of the storyline.

And, sometimes at the end of a game, you miss the characters, just as you do when you turn the last page of a good book. Which is why these books make perfect sense: another chance for fan interaction.

As we contemplate how to apply old laws to new forms of digital media, new forms of digital media are morphing with the old ones.

So, while technology threatens to knock the doors off our old understanding of speech and fair use, software may actually deliver the bigger blow by changing what our definitions of media and speech. Software is speech.