Should Information Be Free?

Tmattos93 wrote: Just to be clear, and my apologies if I didn't do so with my last post, I do think that the people who collect, organize, and distribute these sources of information should be fairly compensated for their time and efforts.

Yeah, I'm down with that. We just have to be honest with ourselves. The reason I brought up the compensation by libraries is because they are funded by the government which means that people who don't even use libraries at all are basically buying their books and therefore indirectly paying for a "subscription" type of right to borrow those books collectively paid for. So if we do this for something else, the expense of that has to be calculated and paid for like any other government program.

I think there just needs to be different options considered. Like some kind of free tier vs paid tier. Because even libraries charge you if your book, movies, or audio is overdue. So in that case its free until you forget to bring it back. With raw information there's no physical product to suffer from the same constraints. But that's what makes fair compensation an even bigger issue.

Something to think about - now - this day In age - no matter where your at, we can store any information we choose. May be a bit different in some places but for the most part - information IS pretty free right now. You should see the “personal library’s” I’ve seen, would put some institutions to shame and giver better a run for their money... most signed by authors with hand written notes from them. Anyhow, what truly CANT we learn in this time in age? Think about that if you like.

Libraries do buy their books; or people donate used copies. Sometimes the author donates a copy to the library. This is advantageous to the author because it brings exposure. Author royalties - hmm; wouldn't buy materials to create a light saber - at least not in my case, but would buy a cup of coffee so I can keep writing.