Finished reading it during lunch
The basic thesis -- and this is supported with examples from the U.S. Post Office up through the latest available figures on net usage -- is that people are willing to spend orders of magnitude more for point-to-point (ie: personal) communication than they are for content (broadcast media).
Newspapers used to be delivered by the Post Office. They made up 90% of the mail, by weight. But most of the money was coming from letters. Because of regulations written to ensure that everyone had access to the "content," letters were effectively subsidizing the newspaper delivery. Once the regulations were changed, it was no longer economically viable to mail newspapers.
Flash forward to the late 90's. The majority of the bits transmitted across the internet are media files. (Images, sound, video, etc.) But by far the greater number of transmissions were of small, private communications: primarily email. In polls, given the choice between giving up internet connection and cable TV, responses are split. Given the choice between giving up web browsing and giving up email, people overwhelmingly favor keeping email at the expense of all that pretty "content."
Basically, though the article didn't quite put it this way, people don't just want to listen; they want to talk. Content providers keep arguing for regulation and development targeted at making it easier for them to push more content downstream. But it would seem more people are more interested in being able to push their own content upstream.
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I can't be a Democrat because I like to spend the money I make.
I can't be a Republican because I like to spend the money I make on drugs and whores.
