I’ve been meaning to post on this for a while now, since listening to this presentation Chris Anderson made before book publishers last summer. Now that it’s a Wired cover story – Free! Why $0.00 Is the Future of Business – I’d better snap to it. Anderson, author of The Long Tail, has hit another memetic bullseye with his next/current book project FREE.

How can a DVR be free? How can air travel be free? How can a CD be free? How can directory assistance be free? Anderson breaks down the new, increasingly common and advisable economic models: “freemium”, ad-supported, cross-subsidies, zero marginal cost, labor exchange, and gift economy. These methods are more possible today because we’re dealing more with abundance – bits, bytes, bandwidth, digital storage, etc. – than with scarcity. It’s a really interesting, relevant, and paradigm-shifting (sorry!) subject; something more and more businesses will need to consider in the future. Good read.

books Chris Anderson Free pricing