Post-Scarcity

Wow, now I have a NAME for what I've been trying to say all along. You simply cannot apply the same concepts of "ownership" and "control" to a commodity that is not scarce. the "Digital" world changes everything. People still say that illegal downloading is "stealing" but it's nonsense. I think people are starting to see this now.

The music "industry" has already lost its customers, because it treats them like crap, and now it's loosing its artists too. I honestly don't see how a middle man industry can survive without the support of the people on both sides of them, or at least the support of one side. The RIAA has neither!!

Rock stars following in open-source developers' footsteps | Crave : The gadget blog

Data is a post-scarcity commodity. Post-scarcity, as the name suggests, is the successor of scarcity, upon which our current economic systems are built. When you consume scarce goods - eat a chocolate bar, or buy a CD - there is one less of that commodity in the marketplace. But when you consume a post-scarce item - download an application, or an mp3 - you copy it. Meaning there is now one more of that commodity out there, not less. This is how the success of a post-scarce product is measured, by the number of times it has been reproduced.

And this is of course very similar to how the music industry works. Or how it would work if you were to take the record companies out of the picture. In a crowded marketplace the greatest issue for a new band is being heard, getting their music to as many ears as possible, not maximising the profit on shifting units. There are a hundred thousand people with the talent to write a great song, but there are only a select few who can attract a wide audience with it. This initial recognition has nothing to do with the pricing mechanisms of CDs, it is to do with reputation. Kudos is the main commodity of agalmic economics.