• TechFlash, Thursday, July 16, 2009 1:30 PM

In an interview with TechFlash, Wired Editor Chris Anderson, author of the new book "Free," argues that despite the emergence of Google and other champions of free software and services, that there is still a place for traditional operating systems and productivity software that sell for $250.

In other words, "you can compete with free," he says, but in the end you're not actually selling software, you're selling "convenience, risk-reduction, peace of mind, a contractual promise. You're selling something that people value." Take iTunes, for example. People use Apple's media store "because it's easier and safer and faster (than illegal file-sharing), not really because people feel some sort of moral obligation to pay for music...so they're not selling music. They're selling simplicity," Anderson says.

So, how does Anderson qualify "free"? Is it a good or bad phenomenon? "I'm amoral," he says. "I don't project my values on anybody else. I try to describe what we're seeing already happening." That said, he adds: "I think history will show what of this turned out to be positive and what turned out to be negative. I think you'll see both. The Internet clearly has winners and losers, the Internet has many positives, and it also is a platform for division and polarization and bad behavior. It would be probably wrong to even speculate in advance whether this is a net positive or a net negative."

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