Media: The Register hears the Argument for Digital Media Flat Fees

This article is hybrid: part book review and part interview with Terry Fisher, but it is valuable in clearly laying out one future for digital content as an alternative for the charging models being mooted at present.

The Register's Andrew Orlowski is clearly pro-Fisher's analysis and suggestions. He doesn't go into the impact on behaviour and design of a flat rate for use of media, but the bones are there.

'Assuming an ACS [alternative compensation system] compensated the movie and music rights holders 20 per cent of lost revenue in the first year, as Fisher's proposal does, the burden on each US household would be 50 cents a week. At a time when US citizens are nickel and dimed to death on their utility bills (not to mention health insurance) this might be the most popular "tax" in history. It's certainly a progressive alternative to what Jobs, Gates and the RIAA propose, which essentially entails charging citizens for rights that they already enjoy for free. And it's hard to envisage a more dramatic or transforming use of technology than to walk down the street, collecting music as you go.'

Associated Link: The Register: Digital music: flat fee futures

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