<nettime> Money in cyberspace

[andre.ecary@post.sk]

Money in cyberspace
(personal point of view)

There are big problems with money on the internet. As one of many
examples, consider music recording companies, who desperately try to stop
an exchange of music files through the internet. Their effort is like
trying to stop the wind from blowing, no matter how big, rich and
powerfull they were just a short time ago. When people have a possibility
to download music from the internet, and pass it to others by simply
copying the files, why would they buy CDs. 

The use of money in association with the internet, software and even any
sort of information is very closely related to protection of copying. What
happened to music can (and will) happen to movies, newspapers, books and
virtually everything, what can be converted into digital form. 

Cyberspace (internet, world of information, or call it whatever you want)
is simply made up of different elements than physical world. Different
natural laws rule there. Words like \'distance\' or \'place\' have
completely changed it\'s meanings in cyberspace, and actually very few
properties of real world can be translated into cyberspace, simply because
it is not build up from a mass. 

Why I am saying this is, that I want to focus on copying. This proces has
completely different attributes in cyberspace than in physical world. Just
try to copy your TV-set and try to copy some digital books or music (those
.doc, .ps or .mp3 files you have on your hard disc). Really a different
thing, isn\'t it? 

Copying is an essential property of information. So essential that one
could compare it to a simple move in physical world. Imagine that you buy
a TV-set and the seller tells you \'Okey, when you once install it in your
room, you can by no means move it to a different place. You know, we
don\'t want you to move it, so we placed a mechanism inside, which will
cause malfunction whenever you move it.\' It\'s pretty absurd, but to make
a digital copy is even more simple than moving your TV-set to another
room. 

Money works well as a medium of exchange of goods. You give two times more
goods, you get two times more money. But say the same about cyberspace -
you give two times more copies of your software, e-art, information for
two times more money, and notice, that copying means no work or energy.
There\'s something wrong with it. 

Using money in connection with information and the internet is a try to
adapt a mechanism developed for physical world into a completely different
setting. However, money are one of the corner-stones of today\'s world and
almost nobody from \'civilized\' countries can imagine world without
money, but in cyberspace, they somehow don\'t work well. It\'s a question
whether to race for better and better copy protection methods, to try to
adapt that money mechanism for all costs or to try to find something
different for the cyberspace. Something completely new. 



comments to Andre.Ecary@pobox.sk

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