Sometimes Free Really Means Free
Date : 01 17 2008 Category : Business
TechdirtIskold also seems confused about the difference between monopolies and competition. He claims that Google's decision to give its word processor and spreadsheet application away is "monopolistic" and a "dangerous poker game" that's only possible because Google has a huge pile of cash. This is ridiculous on a couple of different levels. In the first place, it's absurd to think that Google's cash pile gives it an unfair advantage over Microsoft, which has one of the largest cash piles in the history of the world. Second, there are numerous other competitors in the online word processing space, such as Zoho, who don't have Google's large piles of cash, yet still give away online word processors for free. In fact, Google's own word processor actually came from a tiny startup, Writely, who had very little money, but was still giving away the product for free. Third, there's no inherent reason why word processors can't be free. You can make an unlimited number of copies of it just like any other software product. Microsoft has only retained the ability to charge hundreds of dollars for Office because they haven't had enough competition. Now that competition is increasing, the price of office software is likely to fall toward its marginal cost of zero, and companies will need to find more creative ways to turn a profit from it. Cutting prices (including cutting them to zero) in order to increase market share is the opposite of monopolistic. Consumers benefited from Microsoft's decision to give away Internet Explorer in the 1990s, and they benefit from Google's decision to give away Google Docs today.
Tim Lee is an expert at the Techdirt Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Tim Lee and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.
Permalink | Comments | Email This Story