By KRYSTLE CHOW
Published in the Ottawa Business Journal newspaper and website.
April 28, 2008 (May 1 on OttawaBusinessJournal.com)
Click here to view this article on OttawaBusinessJournal.com.
Wired Magazine editor-in-chief
Chris Anderson.
(Photo supplied)Wired Magazine editor-in-chief Chris Anderson previews his new book on how everything online will soon be free
The idea of literally giving something away but still profiting from it isn’t a new concept, but with the advent of the Internet there’s now a new dimension to it – and soon, all products and services we now pay for could become free, says Wired Magazine head honcho Chris Anderson.
It’s the subject of his new book, aptly named Free, which he will be previewing at Celebridee during the Canadian Tulip Festival, held from May 2 to May 19 in Ottawa. The OBJ picked Mr. Anderson’s brain to find out more about the new free economy and what it will mean for businesses.
OBJ: So tell us a bit more about what it means to have an economy where everything is free.
ANDERSON: It’s a broad economic trend that affects every industry everywhere. Any company, product, service that is digital is either going to eventually become free or compete with free; it’s the law of gravity in digital economics. It’s the Google model, where they don’t charge you: Google doesn’t show up on your credit card bill, Google’s free to consumers.
Software’s increasingly moving from a product that you buy to a free service that you go to on the web, the software-as-a-service model. And increasingly, services are moving from professional people you pay for to places you go to for free, be it (more…)
