The idea of the commons refers to farmers sharing a common plot of land, on which they are each entitled to let their cows graze. It is in each farmer's interest to put more and more cows onto the land, even if the capacity of the common is exceeded and eventually there isn't enough grass to sustain everyone's herds. The farmer receives all of the benefits from an additional cow, while the damage to the common is shared by the entire group. If all farmers come to the same individually rational economic decision, the common will be destroyed to the detriment of all.
Of course, what they were doing is reinforcing the internet hacker's mantra that "information wants to be free" and training everyone that they could get the information and content they wanted online free. Why subscribe to the New York Times or Washington Post when you get the content free online? Plus, environmentally sensitive people realized they could not only get their news free but could also save trees and cut down on waste by reading their newspapers online. What a good, green deal.
Newspapers, magazines, and other news organizations created a tragedy of the commons of sorts by unthinkingly conditioning people not to pay for their trusted content.
And the recession isn't the problem. On March 15, the Pew Project for Excellence in Journalism released its annual State of the News Media report which indicated that http://www.stateofthemedia.org/2010/overview_intro.php "in 2009 newspapers, including online, saw ad revenue fall 26 percent during the year, which brings the total loss over the last three years to 43 percent."
Another way of handling the problem is with non-government sanctions, which require collaboration and cooperation among the majority. For example, in some communities that have common grazing land, farmers and herders agree to put up a fence and a gate and have someone man the gate at all times. They agree, for example, that three cows per family will keep the common viable and anyone who wants to graze more than three cows isn't allowed in the gate.
Modern media companies can't collaborate legally (it's called collusion) and agree that everyone has to charge for content and set a minimum price what they will charge (it's called price fixing).
But here's what they can do: the New York Times, the
Members of the QPA can't all agree to charge for their content or what to charge. However, they all have the future of their publications on their minds. They are all concerned about long-term survival. They know what's good for themselves.
Therefore, one of them that is not charging now has to bite the bullet and charge for content (the Wall Street Journal already does charge for some content) and the rest have to voluntarily fall into line and charge a similar amount. Once all the quality publications start charging, the dominoes will fall and the others in the association will start charging for content.
The QPA would merge with the National Newspaper Association and other similar associations and can then figure out cool bundles and discounts and loyalty programs. For example, I could pay The New York Times $200 a year or pay the QPA $600 and get access to all the QPA members content. I could also earn loyalty points for clicking on ads on QPA members' advertisers' content. Why not let The New York Times make some money when I click on an ad it carries rather than let Google make money when I click on one of its search-term ads? I'd rather see The Times make some money than for Google to get even richer.
The QPA could run a national ad campaign on all of its sites, newspapers, and magazines and on television, the theme of which would be "You get what you pay for." The campaign would make the point that just like with insurance or cars or fishing rods, with information to get quality stuff, you've got to pay for it. The purpose of the campaign would be to educate people that information theoretically may want to be free, but good information costs money to collect, so if people want reliable information, they will have to pay for it.
It's an education and pricing problem. Apple showed that most people would pay $.99 for a song rather than steal it if it were easy to do so. The QPA and its members would have to fuss around for a couple of years to find the right price points and bundles, but it could be done.
The education problem is stickier. But the QPA could run a commercial showing a rich-looking man with red suspenders, cuff-linked shirts, and a bow tie ranting about the need for national security and keeping the Army in Afghanistan and then calling his lawyer to set up an offshore tax shelter to avoid paying income taxes. The tag line would be "What's wrong with this picture? Remember, you get what you pay for. If you want good stuff you have to pay for it."
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I drive Subaru's and support unions and use digital cameras mad in Osaka.
Newspapers, magazines and other forms of the old media house our people. Our people are smarter and need to be heard. We control the government and Rush Limbaugh rules the AM radio waves.
John F. Kerry wants Rush to be stopped as the "right" are too naive. Kerry supports the Fairness Doctrine and we should too. Even though the scientists are saying that Global warming is not occurring, we know better.
The plot of land that journalists share now is infinite. We need to regulate it so we have more control in order to control the tea baggers and Sarah Palin.
We need government subsidy for the old media. We should mandate that our intellectual content be digested by all. The "right" is wrong on this matter. Obama went to law school. The right has most scientists and engineers as their intellectual representation and they have not been trained in government.
Government does know best, we know that. Let Go, Let Nacy Pelosi!
Major media would do well to learn the dynamic relationships that have evolved between bloggers and their adherents/readers/communities, instead of regardig their customers merely as faithless fodder for circulation statistics.
Advertisers are pretty uncomplicated folk. They follow the customers' eyes and mouths. Major media follow their customers' hands (reaching for a dime, an on/off switch or a remote control). No wonder they're losing out.
Ford to City
Drop Dead
Miss the Wall Street Journal? Under Murdoch, I think not. Same with all the other papers.
The solution to the tragedy of the commons was to have government oversight. When I went for a PhD in political science they couldn't figure that out. Basic economics. But you had to have calculus to take economics. God forbid calculus in pol sci. They couldn't handle it.
Guess the ivory tower isn't any better at NYU or The New School.
Maybe a real degree from a real school? That was a quote to me once in a problem a PhD couldn't solve. I did 6 months later. Seems to fit here.
Second, this "solution" for newspapers rests on the faulty assumption that we want to save them. Newspapers began as the voices of the people and quickly became the voice of Sauron. Hearst begat Murdoch. Big media is just another instance of the corporate "persons" who prey on humans. We've known how to solve this problem for millions of years: Eat their eggs.
I'm not suggesting we want to save newspapers but rather we need to save responsible journalism. Publicly owned corporate media are a problem; they are concerned with short-term profits, the long-term interests of society.
The media has seriously wasted its common resource, but that resource is the public trust. The major news media is disingenuous and sloppy at best, and willing to outright lie to get viewers and readers at worst. Those people who care about the news enough to potentially pay for it , know that the media has been more concerned with how they make money off the news than whether the news is actually news. Cable news networks seem to have lead the charge on this, but other media has quickly followed suit. Facts are misrepresented. Journalists are cowed by our most extreme media figures. Debates are framed in the media discourse in ways that have little connection with actual reality. When it comes to politics, the public barely engages with actual facts - the one thing news media is supposed to provide.
If news media wants us to pay for their product, they have to make one that is more factually accurate than the Daily Show, which is free. Is it any surprise that no one wants to pay for "real news" when "fake news" is more honest and reliable?
It's not that information wants to be free. It's that it is free. That's why people who have information that is proprietary have to go to such great lengths to protect it. I submit that we never paid for the content of newspapers, but rather the mechanism of information delivery that printed periodicals had a monopoly on. Absent that monopoly, information resumes its normal flow.
The relevant questions are how will the news of tomorrow be collected and how will we fund a vigorous fourth estate absent government intervention and a total collapse into infotainment?
I suspect that the need to have correct and relevant information to make monetary and political decisions will find a way to fund quality independent journalism. I suspect I am participating in its genesis here.
I suspect that the need to have correct and relevant information to make monetary and political decisions will find a way to fund quality independent journalism. I suspect I am participating in its genesis here."
By "here," I assume you're referring to The Huffington Post, which may not be making a profit. Yes, as a society we must find a way to support good content, including The Huff Po, so we might have to pay for it somehow.
And the internet helped us learn how foolish we were to blindly trust their content at any price.