Archive of UserLand's first discussion group, started October 5, 1998.
Re: Oops, you missed some things!
Author: Jeff Kandt Posted: 9/2/2000; 7:43:33 PM Topic: The Lie of "IP" Msg #: 20748 (In response to 20668) Prev/Next: 20747 / 20749
Dave Rogers: For whatever reasons, the market for CD's seems to put the price for a CD in the $10.00 - $15.00 range. Of all the potential people who might be interested in a given artist's work, not all will perceive a win-win transaction at the market price. Many of these people will obtain the artist's work through unconventional means, either from copying friends' CDs, Napster, or other means. That these individuals would never have paid for CD at the market price does not mean that the artist, or recording company, suffers no economic loss. Clearly, the person who obtains the "free" copy would have paid some price for the work...And the producer has lost that revenue by setting the market price too high. But what's "too high" for one person might be pifflingly low for another.
How can you extract maximum revenue from all potential buyers? By allowing them to decide for themselves the maximum they are willing to pay for any given work, even if that amount is zero.
Why in the world would people choose to pay anything greater than zero? Well, doing so would have to be in their own self-interest.
Sound impossible? Maybe not.
It is by no means clear that any of his proposed models would produce the quantity of intellectual property today's market supports. If they were able to do so, I think they would have supplanted the current method already.
As to that last sentence, phoey. The IP model is much under fire right now. I see more and more people wondering whether copyright is the best way to encourage creativity and reward artists. Copyright is getting harder to enforce with every new advance in technology; eventually it will be literally impossible to enforce.
Investment tip: Avoid business models protected by unenforceable laws.
First we have to build a practical voluntary payment system so that artists can attempt the new model and see if it works for them.
Maybe it will and maybe it won't, but we can't know until someone tries it.
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