I think you are right on with this post. I got into a “discussion” on a company-intranet blog about how the future is virtual and the internet frees up societies and people, and fundamentally changes the way nation states and governments and corporations relate, freeing up society to evolve, yada, yada, yada.
What the person failed to see is that the internet economy is virtual, but it’s propped up by physical infrastructure (electric grid, utilities, etc.) which themselves are built up on the zenith of western technological culture post WW-II (electronics, physics, materials science, which itself is the end result of European enlightenment since the Rennaissance. The information age stands on the shoulders of giants, whose culture makes up the foundation, which is not virtual, but physical and historic and very real.
I posited that the future will not be virtual enlightenment, but most likely a struggle tomaintain mastery over the physical resources of the planet upon which the fantasy world of the internet rests.
As for Mrs. Thatcher’s comment about socialism, you do have to wonder whose money it is, and where more comes from, other than the printing office.
Hi Joe, and thanks for your comment. I think you’re right, the connections are not just horizontal across the present infrastructure but are also deeply vertical in time as well.
As I see it, the risk inherent in any technology is that people will choose simply to retreat into the abstraction of the technology’s intermediation, without recognizing that the intermediation is not a destination but simply a tool that permits us to interact with reality in new ways. A way to interact with the T-word, you might say. 😉
Which is a segue to say that I am finding myself absorbed by your blog. I’m working my way through from the beginning and your words, as with your images, are substantial, meaningful, rich, and deeply satisfying. Thank you for challenging me to think and write better. I hope we might continue the discussion!
There has to be more nuance to Anderson’s ideas than his title suggests… because the very corporeal, costly format of the book carrying his message alone makes them otherwise absurd. Like a lot of folks, I read the Gladwell essay, but not Anderson’s book (and yes, I pay for the New Yorker).
Fantasy world of the internet! I love the blasphemy of this simple declaration.
(Don LaFontaine) In a world . . . where price has been uncoupled from value . . . (/Don LaFontaine)
. . . which is where we live today, a guy like Jeff Jarvis can actually *not* get laughed out of the room when he utters brilliance like this bit about the NYT paywall: “So why charge your best customers? Why single them out? Why risk driving them away? The logic eludes me. So do the economics.”
I’ll have to try that the next time I go out to dinner at my favorite restaurant. “Hey, we’ve been coming here every week for years! Why don’t you give me my sushi for free? The logic of charging me for your professional service and quality product eludes me.”
The money quote: “Or we resolve [the transactional imbalance created by gifts or overpayments] by acknowledging the creativity and insight of the giver. Artists do this every time they put a painting in a museum or a song on the radio. We don’t pay for the idea, but we acknowledge it. And then, if it’s particularly powerful, it changes us enough that we become givers, contributing to someone else, passing it along.”
I understand the point Godin is making and agree with it in principle, but his example doesn’t serve his point. Because artists *don’t* put paintings in museums. The museums, which paid the artist (or, more likely, the collector who bought it from the artist for a fraction of its current value) do that. Likewise, artists *don’t* put their songs on the radio. Their labels, which paid the artists (albeit in pennies for each dollar the labels make off sales and broadcast rights) do that.
The distinction is not hair-splitting. Artists who want their work hung in museums or played on the radio reasonably expect to get paid for their work. Not in favors, not in tips in the jam jar on the piano, but in cold hard cash from the people with the deep pockets. Here’s the hard part to get your head around: the people who get it for free — by visiting the museum or by tuning into the radio — aren’t the customers. They’re bystanders. The customers are. The. People. Who. Pay.
Always. Only.
The economy of free is the economy of the incidental bystander who has no say in the what, where, when, why, or how of the product. Bystanders have no say because they have no *stake* in any of those things. Because bystanders. Do. Not. Pay.
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I think you are right on with this post. I got into a “discussion” on a company-intranet blog about how the future is virtual and the internet frees up societies and people, and fundamentally changes the way nation states and governments and corporations relate, freeing up society to evolve, yada, yada, yada.
What the person failed to see is that the internet economy is virtual, but it’s propped up by physical infrastructure (electric grid, utilities, etc.) which themselves are built up on the zenith of western technological culture post WW-II (electronics, physics, materials science, which itself is the end result of European enlightenment since the Rennaissance. The information age stands on the shoulders of giants, whose culture makes up the foundation, which is not virtual, but physical and historic and very real.
I posited that the future will not be virtual enlightenment, but most likely a struggle tomaintain mastery over the physical resources of the planet upon which the fantasy world of the internet rests.
As for Mrs. Thatcher’s comment about socialism, you do have to wonder whose money it is, and where more comes from, other than the printing office.
~Joe
Hi Joe, and thanks for your comment. I think you’re right, the connections are not just horizontal across the present infrastructure but are also deeply vertical in time as well.
As I see it, the risk inherent in any technology is that people will choose simply to retreat into the abstraction of the technology’s intermediation, without recognizing that the intermediation is not a destination but simply a tool that permits us to interact with reality in new ways. A way to interact with the T-word, you might say. 😉
Which is a segue to say that I am finding myself absorbed by your blog. I’m working my way through from the beginning and your words, as with your images, are substantial, meaningful, rich, and deeply satisfying. Thank you for challenging me to think and write better. I hope we might continue the discussion!
There has to be more nuance to Anderson’s ideas than his title suggests… because the very corporeal, costly format of the book carrying his message alone makes them otherwise absurd. Like a lot of folks, I read the Gladwell essay, but not Anderson’s book (and yes, I pay for the New Yorker).
Fantasy world of the internet! I love the blasphemy of this simple declaration.
A provocative post and thoughtful discussion on this subject over on Rough Type:
“Information wants to be free my ass:”
http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2010/01/information_wan.php
One of the commenters even invokes the restaurant metaphor, along the lines of my “restaurant review” post:
“The Last Restaurant Review:”
http://sottovoce.avwrites.com/?p=666
(Don LaFontaine) In a world . . . where price has been uncoupled from value . . . (/Don LaFontaine)
. . . which is where we live today, a guy like Jeff Jarvis can actually *not* get laughed out of the room when he utters brilliance like this bit about the NYT paywall: “So why charge your best customers? Why single them out? Why risk driving them away? The logic eludes me. So do the economics.”
I’ll have to try that the next time I go out to dinner at my favorite restaurant. “Hey, we’ve been coming here every week for years! Why don’t you give me my sushi for free? The logic of charging me for your professional service and quality product eludes me.”
Dumbass.
Today’s Seth Godin post has another variation on the “free-as-in-someone-else-pays” model:
“The hidden power of a gift:” (http://bit.ly/bqKNeo)
The money quote: “Or we resolve [the transactional imbalance created by gifts or overpayments] by acknowledging the creativity and insight of the giver. Artists do this every time they put a painting in a museum or a song on the radio. We don’t pay for the idea, but we acknowledge it. And then, if it’s particularly powerful, it changes us enough that we become givers, contributing to someone else, passing it along.”
I understand the point Godin is making and agree with it in principle, but his example doesn’t serve his point. Because artists *don’t* put paintings in museums. The museums, which paid the artist (or, more likely, the collector who bought it from the artist for a fraction of its current value) do that. Likewise, artists *don’t* put their songs on the radio. Their labels, which paid the artists (albeit in pennies for each dollar the labels make off sales and broadcast rights) do that.
The distinction is not hair-splitting. Artists who want their work hung in museums or played on the radio reasonably expect to get paid for their work. Not in favors, not in tips in the jam jar on the piano, but in cold hard cash from the people with the deep pockets. Here’s the hard part to get your head around: the people who get it for free — by visiting the museum or by tuning into the radio — aren’t the customers. They’re bystanders. The customers are. The. People. Who. Pay.
Always. Only.
The economy of free is the economy of the incidental bystander who has no say in the what, where, when, why, or how of the product. Bystanders have no say because they have no *stake* in any of those things. Because bystanders. Do. Not. Pay.