The media pundit's pundit. Written by NYC insider Jeff Jarvis, BuzzMachine covers news, media, journalism, and politics.
Clueless
: Gawd, Larry Lessig drives me nuts. He’s so obsessively one-note about intellectual property. And he’s so wrong.
He sends his blog readers to a New York Times story by Jake Tapper and then he can’t help adding this:
(BTW: this is a NY Times piece, which means you need to be registered to read it and eventually you
Hard to argue with you on that one, Jeff. We’ve gotten so used to everything being “free” on the ‘net that we lose sight of the economic realities.
It’s a reaction to the failure of Marxism as a viable social system. Lessig, Searls, Winer, etc – wanting to see the Internet as a replacement for that hippie commune that constituted their best youthful days (and which wouldn’t take them in today!).
Sorry, laddies, tis a business…
now structurally (and business wise) his criticism is right: your information and brand is hurt and declines when people can’t link to it, and I feel that the NYT is hurting itself with this policy
WSJ has a feel for the world, as it gives away its opinion journalism, most of it without registration
Forbes gives away almost all of its content (and shoots video)
This is all brand building and making you more relevant. You and Reynolds have both dramatically increased your value and likely future income through giving away your ideas.
but yeah, larry’s an idiot… rotten? no. illadvised? yes.
I completely agree. Professor Lessig doesn’t seem capable of making a very important destinction between two kinds of “free”: free as in “freedom”, and free as in “giving something away for free”. Why should the Times give it’s article away for nothing? All ask is that i’m free to read it (or not). There is nothing rotten in that. It’s just the FREE market! I think that Lessig, who used to make this destinction too, gets carried away by his own rethoric.
Reminds me of a T-shirt idea I had: “INFORMATION WANTS TO BE FREE!” (and in small letters and parens below: ‘But I want a RAISE.’)
Makes no sense. Which means it fits America in ’03;-)