I published a few book on the Internet and they can be
freely downloaded by anyone who has a computer or a
modem. The full text of electronic magazines, trade
journals, billboards, professional publications, and
thousands of books is available online. Hackers even
made sites available from which it is possible to download
whole software and multimedia products. It is very easy
and cheap to publish on the Internet, the barriers to entry
are virtually nil. Web pages are hosted free of charge, and
authoring and publishing software tools are incorporated
in most word processors and browser applications. As the
Internet acquires more impressive sound and video
capabilities it will proceed to threaten the monopoly of the
record companies, the movie studios and so on.
The second development is also technological. The oft-
vindicated Moore's law predicts the doubling of computer
memory capacity every 18 months. But memory is only
one aspect of computing power. Another is the rapid
simultaneous advance on all technological fronts.
Miniaturization and concurrent empowerment by software
tools have made it possible for individuals to emulate
much larger scale organizations successfully. A single
person, sitting at home with 5000 USD worth of
equipment can fully compete with the best products of the
best printing houses anywhere. CD-ROMs can be written
on, stamped and copied in house. A complete music
studio with the latest in digital technology has been
condensed to the dimensions of a single chip. This will
lead to personal publishing, personal music recording, and
the to the digitization of plastic art. But this is only one
side of the story.
The relative advantage of the intellectual property
corporation does not consist exclusively in its
technological prowess. Rather it lies in its vast pool of
capital, its marketing clout, market positioning, sales
organization, and distribution network.
Nowadays, anyone can print a visually impressive book,
using the above-mentioned cheap equipment. But in an
age of information glut, it is the marketing, the media
campaign, the distribution, and the sales that determine
the economic outcome.
This advantage, however, is also being eroded.
First, there is a psychological shift, a reaction to the
commercialization of intellect and spirit. Creative people
are repelled by what they regard as an oligarchic
establishment of institutionalized, lowest common
denominator art and they are fighting back.
Secondly, the Internet is a huge (200 million people), truly
cosmopolitan market, with its own marketing channels
freely available to all. Even by default, with a minimum
investment, the likelihood of being seen by surprisingly
large numbers of consumers is high.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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