Old thinking

I’m amused as I watch governments and industries try to apply old thinking to new technologies. The politicians and the corporate upper management types just don’t get it, and so their attempts are so pathetic and ineffective.

Internet gambling is an example. Various local, state and federal government bodies want to ban gambling, or at least tax it. When gambling occurred in facilities within their jurisdiction, this was a manageable goal. Now that gambling can occur in cyberspace, with the server located halfway around the world in some other jurisdiction, it’s just about impossible to control it unless one is prepared to forbid anyone to use a computer terminal. But various government bodies still try.

The endless attempts to protect software, DVD movies, and CD music files are another example. The industries labor mightily to invent one complex protection system after another, yet most are circumvented within days of their release. The hackers are every bit as smart as the inventors of the protection systems, there are a lot more of them, they are highly motivated, and the internet lets them efficiently work together.

The problem is that all these groups are still stuck in old thinking. They haven’t yet adapted to the new world of instant, unfettered, worldwide communication. Piracy is certainly a problem, impacting their profits, but solving that problem will require rethinking the commercial process from the ground up to leverage the new technology, not trying to strap on copy protection systems at the end of the marketing chain to protect the old way of doing things.

When VCR recorders first came out, the major movie studios were terrified that such technology would destroy their business. In fact, far from destroying their business, VCR and DVD sales of movies eventually became a major source of profit for the studios, surpassing their profits from traditional movie theaters.

Some software companies are beginning to understand, and are beginning to offer low-cost web-based services rather than packaged software. This begins to make sense. Why should I pay $100-200 for a software package that I have to install, maintain, upgrade, and troubleshoot, and which I only use occasionally? If it were available, I’d much rather log on to a website when I occasionally need a particular service, and pay a few pennies to use it for the few moments I really need it. Not only is that more efficient for me, but that provides a far larger market for the seller, since many people won’t pay $100-200 for the software package, but are happy to pay a few pennies for the service.

Eventually, of course, the old timers will all retire, to be replaced by a generation that grew up with the internet and understands its potential. Until then, we can all be amused by the futile efforts of those politicians and corporate executives who simply can’t adjust their thinking to new circumstances.