[RawAlex]

freemium is one of those ideas that will come and go so fast, that it will be forgotten by all but business students 20 years from now. It is a horrible idea that only works when you first admit that your initial product is worthless.

There are people in the world trying to push freemium or "selling the scarce" onto the music business. Don't fight piracy, just give away all your music and hope to sell enough concert tickets (and personal interaction chances, and hoodies, and t-shirts) to make a living. One whackjob even suggests that offering fans a chance to play mini-putt with the artists is a valid business model.

The problem is the real value of the deal. What the people really value is the music. They want music for their ipod, it is where they will actually get benefit from the artist 365 days a year, not for the 2 hours ever 4 years that they might show up in their town to play a concert. Piracy has artificially reduces the price of music to zero, but it has not killed the value. Value is what people really pay for.

Do you think people go to porn tube sites to check out the sexy dating site ads? Nope. They go for the porn. They value porn, they don't value dating sites. 99% of the visitors don't even click on a banner, many of them intentionally block ads out. They value porn. Only widespread piracy (both torrent and illegal tube) are the reasons why people won't pay for your porn content. If there was no other way to get it, people would pay for porn because THEY VALUE IT.

They don't value hoodies, they don't value dating sites, they don't value mini-putt games... they value the underlying product. Freemium requires that you devalue your own product in their eyes, a fatal marketing mistake.