No Free Lunch

In 1984, the first Hackers Conference was held in Marin County, California. In 1984, being a hacker was a compliment. Apple just produced the first MacIntosh. It wasn't a Mac yet, it was a MacIntosh, black and while only. IBM just introduced the first IBM PC, 64K of RAM and 2 floppies. At the time, we didn't talk Gigs or even Megs but only Kilobytes.

At that conference, there was an argument between Steve Wozniak, who created the Apple I and II and Steward Brand, the founder of the "Whole Earth Catalog". The argument was about computers, data and programs, but it's affecting us, photographers, every day, especially the professional photographers. Brand's remarks were transcribed in 1985.

Steward Brand: On the one hand information wants to be expensive, because it's so valuable. The right information in the right place just changes your life. On the other hand, information wants to be free, because the cost of getting it out is getting lower and lower all the time. So you have these two fighting against each other.

Steve Wosniak: Information should be free, but your time should not.

What's that got to do with us the photographers? All professional photographers started to fight the same conflict when we switched from film to digital. Why? Because the marginal cost of a photo is 0. It costs almost nothing to make a digital photo. It literally costs nothing to copy and distribute a digital photo.

Professional photographers take the side of Steve Wozniak, while amateurs take the point of view of Steve Brand and give away their photos. We are still today fighting this battle. When will it be solved? It will not. It will never be solved on a global basis. Each professional photographer will have to create their own market.