Chris Anderson's "Free": A New Freeconomy

According to Chris Anderson's book Free, the internet is giving way to a free culture and economy, one where content is becoming cheaper to consume to the point of no cost at all. But my question is, does this necessarily make creating the content cheap to the point of being free?

There are millions of hobby bloggers in the world, who not only post their content for free, they create it for free. However, with the examples that Anderson uses in his book, can the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal afford to post their content for free, and produce it also for free?

Anderson is right in believing that a new economy must grow out of this "free content" business. Unless websites and websites of publications find a way to make a profit over their free content, the newspaper business will one day be run over by the hobby bloggers of the world, who will be the only writers out there willing to post their content for free.

There is a certain prestige and educated background that traditional newspapers have, that cannot be sold or imitated. And with thousands of people still subscribing to paper print editions of newspapers and magazines, maybe the free digital revolution will happen later than sooner. But if the traditional newspaper industry wants to survive, they need to find a better way to make money, because they can't give away their product for free forever.

The bait-and-switch methods of Jell-O and Gillete may have worked in the early 20th century, but as media, commerce, and life moves into the digital age, industry leaders need to start thinking less 20th century and more 21st century.