The Death of Free

As a person without a huge salary with which to be the early adopter of new technologies that I fundamentally feel is my birthright, I welcomed with open arms the new type of business models defined as 'Freemium' by Chris Anderson: a basic free version for those who don't mind the occasional advert or limited  personalisation, and the paid version for those that do.


This seemed eminently reasonable...even a 21st century take on socialist ideals of 'From each according to their means, to each according to their needs'.


However, what has become increasingly apparent to me is that there are too many with little means and too few with demanding needs. Spotify, for example, recently told me I could no longer log on - as I have been doing for around two years now - for free. That is, 'Freemium' has been replaced by a traditional 'Squeezing the Lemon' model where we, the paying punters, are the lemons.


If I now want to log on to Spotify, it offers two options as before: Basic and Premium: the latter still costing £9.99 per month with the former now requiring a monthly payment of £4.99!


I'd be interested to know if this change has forced a huge drop in Spotify's user numbers or a huge rise in subscription fees?


I'd also be interested in knowing if this was always the intention: to gain market share before forcing people to pay, or if it is a result of the decline in advertising spend since the start of the recession?


What is clear is that you can trust no one...keep your own records, CDs, tapes and mp3s; do not assume the freedom of the internet will forever be free (just look at News Corp's paywall); and remember that the 'man' can turn off the juice any time he (or she) wants.


Internet access should not be considered a human right like water, food, shelter and freedom from torture, but there should be controls ensuring content providers get paid whilst also allowing access to that content for all.


The only way to do this, as has been mentioned before, is through taxation. Tax the broadband and mobile  connections (naturally and rightly corporations would pay more than little old ladies doing supermarket shopping online) and distribute the funds to content owners according to the amount they have been viewed or listened to.


A brave new digital world where everyone wins...