Friday, 21 March 2008
Monday, 10 March 2008
Media Upgrade Liscences
I own the Lord of the Rings DVDs, so what will I do when they are released in HD?
It's the same story for my Prodigy CDs and should be the same for my copy of Photoshop CS, all just data on disks. But unlike the record labels the software industry grew up with one click, one to many piracy and has a business model that reflects that. Back in the Golden Age of albums and films, a paradigm changing technology shift would arrive perhaps once in a record label exec's carrier. Now they arrive weekly. So instead of hitting the litigation panic button with each new technology why not adopt software's 'full version' / 'upgrade' model.
Let me buy a DVD, with a little gold leaved, hologramed liscence agreement in the case. I now own the rights to consume that media, where and when I want. Let me download it from bittorent, burn it to Blueray or copy it from a friends iPod. Then sell me the upgrade to HD, then 3D, subjective immersion or whatever comes next... Make it worth my while to buy rather than renting or stealing. People buy software so where is the difference?
Posted by LordLobster at 22:34