The headline should probably read the other way around, as what people make money of these days is mostly information, ’cause as you say, data is free…

(for those not following me; data is the raw material used to make information. Information is a refined product, filtered and tailored to an entity’s wishes, knowledge is what comes from information)

nformation doesn’t want to be free. It doesn’t yearn, it doesn’t struggle against bonds. It just is, like a rock just is. People want information to be free. There’s a significant difference between the two.

Dude, when people use anthropomorphisms, they don’t usually intend to be taken literally. When people say that, I don’t think that there is a person on earth who thinks that what is meant is that information has thoughts, feelings and desires, instead of that information, by it’s nature (and our), is difficult to contain, and is rarely worth the effort.

I think that the term ‘free’ here refers as much to liberality as to cost.

nformation doesn’t want to be free. It doesn’t yearn, it doesn’t struggle against bonds. It just is, like a rock just is. People want information to be free. There’s a significant difference between the two.

Yes, this is true but there is more to the “information wants to be free” mantra. I think it alludes to the very nature of information - that it can be transmitted and copied effortlessly. That given potent transition medium it spreads like a wildfire. And that once you release it into the wild, you can never really make it unavailable - once you put something on the internet, it will always be there - as long as someone will want to see it, it will always resurface somewhere.

On the other hand, it is very difficult to keep information from spreading. If you want it to be scarce, you keep it to yourself, or share it only with a select group of people. But the more people you share it with, the higher probability is that one of them won’t be able too keep it a secret.

How many people in the street are clamouring to know how to make the ceramic compounds that make up the space shuttle’s heat shield? Not many, because they couldn’t care less. So, if you want to make your own, it’s not cheap, let alone free.

Very true but that is not the point. The point is, that it is only expensive as long as it is kept a trade secret. Once it leaks out, it’s free. Making the compounds using this knowledge is not free, but the knowledge itself is.

Anyway, look at Kevin’s article on the “Technology wanting to be freee”. He doesn’t anthropomorphosise technology either. He just notes that as the technology improves the basic commodity becomes cheaper and cheaper.

For example, when you compare the price of your first cell phone plan (you know, that huge brick weighing a ton and having very poor reception almost everywhere) with what you pay today (factoring in inflation) you will probably notice that they are relatively close to each other. But the service you get today is probably much better than the one you got years ago. There are more cell towers, the reception is better, the phone has a more powerful antenna. In addition your phone now has much more built in features - it has a camera, a loud speaker, a gps unit, a web browser perhaps. In other words you get much superior service than what you got with your very first cell phone for relatively the same price. In other words, the cost of making basic calls over a cellular network must have dropped significantly over the years due to advances in technology. What you are paying for now are all the added features, and new services that ride on top of that basic utility.

This guy theorizes that this applies to all technology. Every popular technology becomes a commodity, and it’s base price tends to gravitate towards zero as we build new services and products on top of it. He explains it better though. It is a really interesting read.

It’s a bit like petrol. Petrol doesn’t yearn, but people want it to be free. In places where security isn’t tight enough, people puncture oil pipelines and take it for themselves.

Think about it - it’s not ‘technology wants to be free’. It’s ‘consumers want technology they use to be free’. How many people in the street are clamouring to know how to make the ceramic compounds that make up the space shuttle’s heat shield? Not many, because they couldn’t care less. So, if you want to make your own, it’s not cheap, let alone free.

While this isn’t really what you’re discussing (which is how to maintain a business in the current environment), we do need to move away from anthropomorphosising ‘information’ and ‘technology’, especially as things that need to be freed (in the sense of freeing an animal from a cage).

Then again I don’t know of that many artists who make their living exclusively on their web comics. It is possible to get a decent stream of revenue from advertising but only if you have a strong reader base.

I like the model that webcomics usually adopt these days. The primary content is offered for free, but they are able to turn a profit by selling fans merchandise associated the comic.

In fact, this makes for a great proof of concept: With many webcomics you can see any comic for free almost instantly, yet people still opt to buy hardbound collections.