Seth Godin: The Future Is Here. Deal With It.
An interesting debate is percolating about the new book, “Free,” by Chris Anderson.
I haven’t read it (yet), but apparently Seth Godin and Malcolm Gladwell have. Anderson’s book says that as computing power increases and its cost decreases, information products are essentially going to be free.
In a New Yorker article, Gladwell disagrees with the theory. He, pretty adroitly, brings up reasons why Anderson’s theory will flop: from the inability for YouTube to turn a profit to the failure for nuclear energy to produce super cheap power.
In response, Godin declares a mighty, “So what?” Whatever the price of nuclear power in China is, Godin points out, the digital world is getting cheaper, faster, and more powerful. Whether or not there’s a business model to support it, the info-Singularity approacheth. Godin counters:
The first argument that makes no sense is, “should we want free to be the future?”
Who cares if we want it? It is.
The second argument that makes no sense is, “how will this new business model support the world as we know it today?”
Who cares if it does? It is. It’s happening. The world will change around it, because the world has no choice. I’m sorry if that’s inconvenient, but it’s true.
There’s a similar debate on Automated Trading.
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is one of my favorite financial books of all time. It's an allegory about a guy who has a terrible job, and how he overcomes challenges to achieve his dreams.
