Radiohead, open source, and the problem with free

What a short, strange trip it was, but it's now over. With little fanfare, Radiohead has stopped its free promotion of In Rainbows via its "pay whatever the heck you want, we're rich already!" model. The band's manager hardly gave a ringing endorsement to the effort:

This was a solution to a series of issues. I doubt it would work the same way ever again.

Faint praise, indeed.

It's too bad, but perhaps it's not surprising. I paid $20 for my copy (and yes, I have the receipt to prove it) but the music is worth far more to me. It is one of the best albums I've ever heard--I listen to it almost daily. But human nature is to try to get something for nothing, and most Radiohead so-called fans did just that.

Interestingly, this same phenomenon is as true of software/IT as it is of music. Give an IT buyer the option of getting something for nothing, and she will, nine times out of 10. Not because she's evil, but because when it comes time to fork over the cash, it's always easier to retain that which we're not compelled to give up.

This is why, despite my preference for revenue models that don't depend on proprietary extensions to otherwise free software, every successful business model will always rely in part on something proprietary. In the software world, I believe the proprietary hook is best expressed in "proprietary services" that you only get as a paid subscriber. This includes break/fix support, but it's also things like Red Hat Network: services expressed in software but that don't block the use of the core software that customers need to run their businesses.

An overly convenient and semantic distinction? I don't think so. Keeping a database proprietary hurts the customer, but closing off a service that would otherwise expedite development on that database (which development can happen regardless of the tool, with the exact same end result)...this seems acceptable to me.

In an ideal world, customers would pay for value. But we don't. And so it's fair play for vendors to offer convenient excuses to pay for their products. The trick is to ensure that the desire to get paid doesn't end up crippling the ability for customers to maximize value from one's products due to proprietary locks.

To be continued...

[pdskep]

I have yet to understand the fascenation so many people have with Radiohead. They are a pretty good band, but there are so many less popular bands that are much better. I paid nothing for In Rainbows and it was only worth slightly more to me. I'll stick with OK Computer.

[pdskep]

BTW, I forgot to mention this experiement was a really bad idea. People will come to expect free music and it will become a commodity with very little value and the quality will come to reflect this. I believe this has already begun to happen.

[rehtneug]

sorry, but this is short sighted. Aside from factors about artist independence, and just the message behind it which says no need to be greedy. I understand this is not the point of the article, but if you are going to comment, shouldn't the entire picture be taken into consideration?

If the cd, set of music, whatever, is the best you ever heard, doesn't that provide the opportunity for the band to increase fan base, crowd size at concerts, merchandising, and whatever else they can think of? Wouldn't this lead to new, innovative ways to make money in an industry which is essentially dying?

[M C]

CNet teaser was massively misleading for a supposedly journalistic organization - "Radiohead gives up on free" - but then again I expect cheap sensationalism for clicks.

Your piece, though, was good. Commodity pricing models are for commodities, not art or unique software.

[tarrantm]

If only. The company I work for refuses to accept anything free and has a mindset that anything free is crap. Which of course leads to paying exorbitant amounts of money to consultants to come in and implement solutions that are never properly supported and cease to work the day the contract runs out.

Perhaps you should try and find out why the human nature of getting something for nothing doesn't work in the business world.

[gerrrg]

I paid $8.

It's a really good album - House of Cards is really good...in my top 5 Radiohead songs.

[didfem]

Your following broad statement is 100% wrong:
"Give an IT buyer the option of getting something for nothing, and she will, nine times out of 10."
Why? Because the whole world is offered the most advanced FREE Operating System and FREE applications that they can use for just about everything they want to do with a computer, but 90% of the word want to pay for what they can get for free. I am talking about free Linux software versus non-free Windows software.

[adderuppa]

pdskep misses a vital point. You were at least given the option to listen to something you might not otherwise have done, because it was offered for free. I downloaded the album, paid nothing for it, and on the strength of what I heard, bought the deluxe box set. Admitedly I am a fan, but one that considers half of their recent output to be a miss, rather than a hit. I would probably not have bought a full price shop copy withought the chance of listening in advance.

With regard to software, I write web apps. I have a little task timer out there, that does what a large number of others do. I have struggled for a long time with the notion of tiered tariffs that charge for extra functionality, particularly web-based ones.

There is no denying that the majority will not pay for something if payment is not mandatory, but surely the whole point is that with the internet as your shop front, you only need a small percentage of users to actually pay in order to generate a potentially healthy revenue stream.

I have trouble convincing business associates of the merit of this argument. Therefore I am conducting my own experiment, putting my money where my mouth is. My time tracker is available for an absolutely minimal flat monthly fee, with the facility to define a higher amount, depending on what you can afford or are willing to pay.

www.adderuppa.com