Latest free news
This is a good sign: it's getting really hard to keep on top of the flood of "free" news. I'm on the road (in Atlanta, talking to radio folks), but here, in telegraphic form, are the latest ones of note from the past few days:
[First, a news flash! My book will be previewed as the cover story in Wired this month. Out in about ten days. Link then. I think you'll like it ;-)]
- Kevin Kelly has been on tear of great writing/thinking about free, including this delightful rhapsody on eight new scarcities created by free (remember: every abundance creates a new scarcity), and this, on how technology "wants to be free".
- Another great thinker/writer about free is Techdirt's Mike Masnick. If you haven't subscribed to his feed, you should. Start here.
- Tim O'Reilly's TOC conference, now underway, has spurred the book industry to announce some modest experiments in free, such as limited versions of free online books and selling books by the chapter. Harper Collins is taking the lead, including free books by Paulo Coelho and Neil Gaiman. The idea is that these are "samplers" that will drive sales of older books. This is all good, but it's just a start...
- Q: Does Microsoft's bid for Yahoo stem from the company's fear that Office is competing with free? (A: No. But I appreciate the suggestion that free productivity software in now a mainstream idea anyway...)
- Whoops! Glenn Fleishman reminds me that the biggest free news of the day is actually Starbucks switching to free WiFi for people who use the Starbucks cards. [My excuse for the miss: I'm an Verizon Evdo junkie, even though it's anything but free, and I don't use WiFi in public spaces anymore]
Missed the biggest free news of the day: Starbucks switches to AT&T for in-house Wi-Fi, bringing "free" to millions of people. 12 million DSL, fiber, and remote-access business customers get Starbucks Wi-Fi at no extra cost. Anyone who makes any purchase in a given month of any value using a Starbucks stored-value card gets two hours of free Wi-Fi every day that month. All current roaming partners of AT&T add Starbucks for 'free.' Wi-Fi's price tag just dropped precipitously in the U.S.
Posted by: Glenn Fleishman | February 11, 2008 at 10:10 PM
You write: "I don't use WiFi in public spaces anymore". Why's that? You should avoid such unexplained strong statements in your texts :-)
Posted by: Antti Tähtinen | February 12, 2008 at 03:46 AM
I just found the short presentation (14 slides) on SlideShare.net.
A good way to describe the "free" to "premium" approach :
http://www.slideshare.net/Miikka/business-10-vs-business-20
Free is just a pretext for something lucrative, like you said, first, catch the attention, take care of your reputation and $$$ may follow...
Posted by: Luc Vaillancourt | February 12, 2008 at 04:41 AM
Not to speak for Chris, but everyone I know who switched to EVDO seems to say the same thing. $60 per month, and decent to good service everywhere without any configuration issues. Wi-Fi is different everywhere, even though (for me) it generally always works. I have many friends for whom Wi-Fi never seems to work right.
Posted by: Glenn Fleishman | February 12, 2008 at 07:00 AM
Communication costs are trending towards Free, which should also make Education Free as well. With all this free information, how much longer are people going to pay $160,000 for a college degree in Communications. With Sallie Mae (Lender subsidized heavily by national government) in trouble, you have to wonder whether that is any indication of the economics to come regarding our Education system and The Long Tail.
Posted by: Doug Wolkon - Author of The New Game | February 13, 2008 at 12:45 PM
I attempted to post a trackback to this, but it doesn't appear to have worked.
The additional information regarding "Free" is quite interesting. I was fortunate enough to attend a presentation that Chris gave at BAI TransPay. Not surprisingly, the topic remained the focus of discussion (hallway, expo, meals, etc.) for the remainder of the conference.
As an aside, I've also made the switch to EVDO (albeit due to a built-in device in my laptop). The always there capability is of huge value when traveling.
Posted by: Tyler Hannan | February 13, 2008 at 11:16 PM
How to use Free as a foundation for your strategy?
First you have to understand the nature of Giving. And what is the difference between giving and strategic giving.
I just published a book about the subject. Its informative and fun to read AND OF COURSE ITS FREE! Download it from my site www.strategyofgiving.com.
Posted by: Miikka Leinonen | February 15, 2008 at 03:45 AM
Thanks for the reference to Kevin Kelly's "Better Than Free," essay.
I had just read 8 seminar points on an eBay workshop which used several of the same ideas, notably Trust, Immediacy, Accessibility, Findability, in different words. The comments on Kevin's essay provoked thought, as do many of the comments on your blog posts. I'll look for your book review in WIRED.
Posted by: Irene Grumman | February 16, 2008 at 10:40 PM
well – what people don't know is that Harper Collins only launched this free online reading site after the bestselling author Paulo Coelho revealed his pirate coelho blog to the world during the DLD conference in Munich last January.
I read the interveiw he gave for Newsweek and can't help to join the dots:
http://www.newsweek.com/id/108715
I doubt Harper Collins would have made such a move without this author's pressure.
Thumbs up for Pirate Coelho!
Posted by: Aart | February 18, 2008 at 01:36 AM
I guess Microsoft's bid for Yahoo will not happen in the near future. Since, Yahoo growing in the right pace they'll expect more price than what Microsoft offers and there is no possibility to close this deal anytime soon.
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Posted by: Smith | February 18, 2008 at 09:02 AM
Free works, but I have some concerns about current free discussions. Free trend should not mean 'non-free' models are wrong, or we have figured out the ultimate business model.
A manual trackback here, as I cannot do it with my blogger blog.
Posted by: hyokon | February 18, 2008 at 07:00 PM
Free is a powerful rival. Unless you are way ahead in terms of quality or some other element, people might dump you for free. Now this should already give people an idea on how to incorporate free into their own businesses. Maybe the only thing that can equally compete with free is another free.
Posted by: Julie, writer Surefirewealth.com | March 03, 2008 at 03:56 AM
Free works, but I have some concerns about current free discussions. Free trend should not mean 'non-free' models are wrong, or we have figured out the ultimate business model.
http://cagag.blogspot.com/
Posted by: casto | September 08, 2008 at 02:36 AM
thanks...
Kabin
Konteyner
Posted by: kabin | June 13, 2009 at 10:10 AM