Price Discrimination: An Example

(Austrian) Economics
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The rental rates on iTunes are fairly well established. You pay most for a new HD release, a little less for an older movie, and less yet for non-HD.

But one movie on iTunes rents for more than double the usual, highest established rate. What’s going on here? Should we send in a “rogue economist,” perhaps, like the dudes of Freakonomics fame?

Well, they would know, since it’s their movie. Freakonomics: The Movie, that is being rented on iTunes for more than double the regular rental price. And, though this may be just the kind of puzzle Levitt and Dubner like to fix upon …

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Daily Anarchist Interviews Walter Block

(Austrian) Economics, Anti-Statism, Education, The Basics
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The Daily Anarchist has posted a nice, short interview of Walter Block by Seth King, touching mostly on Block’s history in the libertarian movement and his thoughts on the prospects for liberty and the tactics and strategy libertarians employ. A few interesting excerpts:

Seth: Would you mind explaining to me exactly what Anarcho-Capitalism means to you?

Walter: The first part of this phrase, Anarcho-Capitalism, means that there shall be no government. Private firms will undertake all supposed government functions, such as protection from foreign and domestic enemies, adjudication, supplying supposed public goods such as light houses (in a by gone era), flood control, education, welfare, health, money, etc. The second part means that the law will support private property rights, money, etc., in contradistinction to left wing or socialist anarchism.

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Dollar Got the Blues: The Official Song of Dollar-Haters

(Austrian) Economics, Pop Culture, Statism
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The song was written in 1971 by Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown, a long-time resident of Slidell, Louisiana.

Live 04/16/83 in Hamburg, Germany: Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown (guitar/vocals), Homer Brown (tenorsax), Bill Samuell (tenorsax), Joe Sunseri (baritonesax), Craig Wroten (piano), Miles Wright (bass), Robert Shipley (drums).

HT Dick Clark for bringing this to my attention.

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Progressive Egalitarians Should Be Anti-IP

(Austrian) Economics, Business, IP Law, Libertarian Theory, Pop Culture, The Left, Vulgar Politics
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The Obama Administration insists that “‘Piracy is flat, unadulterated theft,’ and it should be dealt with accordingly.” Nonsense, of course. Only scarce goods can be property and therefore only scarce goods can be stolen. Ideas or information patterns are nonscarce goods. If I take your bicycle, you don’t have it anymore. If I copy your idea, now we both have it. Copying, i.e., piracy, is not theft.

As the Left is wont to do in lieu of sound argument, US Commerce Secretary Gary Locke recently related what is meant to be a heartrending story:

Recently, I’ve had a chance to read letters from award winning writers and artists whose livelihoods have been destroyed by music piracy. One letter that stuck out for me was a guy who said the songwriting royalties he had depended on to ‘be a golden parachute to fund his retirement had turned out to be a lead balloon.’ This just isn’t right.

My first immediate thought was why isn’t it right? Shouldn’t a progressive egalitarian’s own values lead him to be against intellectual property?

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“But without intellectual property . . .”

(Austrian) Economics, Business, IP Law, Technology
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The next time someone claims that not having intellectual property laws will squash the little guy and let established companies rule the day, I’m going to remember to bring up Netflix. Mike Masnick at Techdirt reports on Blockbuster’s recent decision to file for bankruptcy — after the heroic Netflix has stolen most of their customers:

Late last week, there were a ton of press reports about how Blockbuster was preparing to declare Chapter 11 bankruptcy in September. It’s not shutting down, but just trying to restructure its debt, get out from under a bunch of store leases and try, try again. That said, this is yet another example of the fallacy of the claim of many that if you have a good idea some big company will just come along, copy it, and be successful. It also demonstrates the huge difference between idea and execution.

Netflix had a good idea and executed well on it. But for years everyone thought it was only a matter of time until the company got destroyed, because all these bigger (at the time) companies were just going to copy Netflix and win. First it was Wal-Mart. The retail giant started a service that seemed almost identical to Netflix way back in 2002. Everyone thought there was no way an upstart like Netflix could compete with the likes of Wal-Mart. Fast forward two and a half years and Netflix took over Wal-Mart’s online DVD rental business, because Wal-Mart’s offering couldn’t compete. …

And, of course, there was Blockbuster. It came out with a Netflix-like offer around the same time that Wal-Mart did, and while it held on for much longer, it was just never able to build up the same sort of userbase that Netflix did, and now the company is going to declare bankruptcy and try to restructure once again.

More at the link. It just goes to show that when you give people a little liberty, you never know what someone will come up with. A giant like Blockbuster or even WalMart can spend as much money as they’d like trying to copy an innovative, well-executed idea, but at the end of the day, the one who best pleases consumers will rule.

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