The "Dangers" of Free 242
With today's Free Summit broaching the subject of the "dangers" of free, TechDirt has an interesting perusal of why free often can't work without a good business model and why it often gets such a bad reputation. "I tend to wonder if this is really a case of free gone wrong or free done wrong. First, I'm always a bit skeptical of 'free' business models that rely on a 'free' scarcity (such as physical newspapers). While it can work in some cases, it's much more difficult. You're not leveraging an infinite good -- you're putting yourself in a big hole that you have to be able to climb out of. Second, in some ways the model that was set up was a static one where everyone focused on the 'free' part, and no one looked at leapfrogging the others by providing additional value where money could be made. The trick with free is you need to leverage the free part to increase the value of something that is scarce and that you control, which is not easily copied. [...] Still, it's an important point that bears repeating. Free, by itself, is meaningless. Free, with a bad business model, isn't helpful either. The real trick is figuring out how to properly combine free with a good business model, and then you can succeed."
Re:Fair beats Free (Score:5, Funny)
Name three things you really shouldn't burn just to keep warm. Sicko.
Combine free with a good business model (Score:1, Funny)
Volume.
That's how you make money on "free."
You're making the classic blunder (Score:4, Funny)
No, not a land war in Asia. From here [chaosmanorreviews.com]:
The Open Source and CopyLeft people are acting as if common sense prevails in US copyright law, and they are, I am told, dead wrong.
Re:Combine free with a good business model (Score:1, Funny)
Volume [emp. added].
That's how you make money on "free."
No wonder my free business model has not been working! I need to turn it up to 11!
Re:WTF is going on? (Score:3, Funny)
Yes. Yes I can. But then I'd have to kill you, because it's a steganographic mechanism to secretly pass messages regarding the oncoming takeover of the coroprate world by rabid fundamentalist Linux enthusiasts operating from secret silos underground (but not deep underground -- usually it's just basement-depth).
Oh, dammit, looks like I'll have to kill you after all -- I let it slip. Me and my big mouth.
Seriously, YMBNH. Or just incredibly slow, to only pick up on the weak AC FP trolling now.
Re:Free needs to be combined with demand (Score:3, Funny)
My brother didn't want one of them, and he fought bitterly with the provider to stop "littering" his door with them. If you go away for a couple of weeks, the piled up papers become a neon sign saying "No One Is Home"... Try as he might, he could not get the door delivered paper to stop showing up.
For a while, my daily commute took me right past the offices of one such "free" newspaper.
It only took about 30 extra seconds to swing through their parking lot and toss the copy of the paper they had left for me onto the sidewalk in front of their office's front door. It never stopped them from littering on my property but it felt good every time I did it.
Re:Fair beats Free (Score:1, Funny)
I think even slashdotters can figure out a good use for the spouse while stuck inside during a cold winter.
Re:WTF is going on? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Fair beats Free (Score:5, Funny)
Hamas?
Re:Obvious? (Score:3, Funny)
Some times when people go to free software for a business they kinda forget a key component on where the money comes from.
Easy! They come from Mark Shuttleworth.
What, you have to learn stuff to become an MBA? ;)
Re:Fair beats Free (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Fair beats Free (Score:5, Funny)
You've enlightened me, sir! Up to now I couldn't understand why proprietary software like Windows and Internet Explorer have experienced so many fewer security vulnerabilities than Free ones like OpenBSD and Firefox. The customers speak and Microsoft listens!