Not too long ago a friend told me an acquaintance offered him 20 gigs of music for his iPod for free. Music by the pound. What kind of music? Who knew? Apparently it didn’t matter.
With the announcement of the Netflix-TiVo’s marketing partnership, are movies by the pound not far behind? Digital media is out there in the ether, as we all know, and can be had for free. Google’s deal with book publishersthat shares revenue with writers and publishing houses for books viewed or downloaded is another example of media potentially seeping into the ether for free. As art and commercial art become available for free over the net, we will have a paradigm shift. The music business is in the dumper. TV and movies will be next, then comes publishing.
So what do we do? Let me think on it a bit…and get back to you.