Twelve Things That Will Be Obsolete in 10 Years

But what will replace the current, struggling media business models? Taxes on mobile device makers? Public funding for news outlets?

In 2020, all things media will be free and the business models of media will be obsolete. But we already know this. What we’re not sure about is how media will persist in the age of free. Movies, news, music, books are all on the precipice. I have no doubt that media will survive; it must. Not because of any highbrow notion of free speech or the societal necessity of art, but simply because you want to spend hundreds of dollars on an iPad or kindle. The device makers have too much invested in content. That iPad is worth nothing if there’s no content to put on it.

Media used to be a physical commodity, something sold in special stores in packages that took up space in our lives. Media in the digital age is totally ephemeral; it’s a fleeting experience rather than an enduring object. The thing that takes up space is the device we use to consume. It is the artifact, this device, upon which we place the emotional value and which we are willing and excited to pay for.

Creation is expensive. So how are we going to pay for our collective media addiction if we aren't prepared to drop a couple dollars for every song we download or book we read or website we browse?

Our love affair with media grows with the ability of our devices. The faster the internet, the more media we can access; the smaller our devices, the more places we can consume in. We are ready and willing to pay for the products that give us access, that provide the platform. People line up for hours to purchase the latest gadget, but those same people don't want to pay for the content. This phenomenon reveals our deep affection for artifacts and the monetary value we place on them.

From an economic perspective, this creates an interesting dynamic, a symbiotic relationship between device and content. The device is worthless if there is nothing to put on it. Without music, the iPod would be a paperweight; without e-books, the Kindle would be a coaster. The device makers, the ones who are making a fortune off of our media madness, are the ones who need media the most. By 2020, it’s the device makers who will become the patrons of the arts, the owners of newspapers, the producers of movies, the publishers of books. They need media to make their products valuable.

In fact, this model is not totally new. Sony has been doing it for decades. Sony subsidized the production of the Walkman and profited from the music. Now the equation is reversed: Sony subsidizes the music and profits from the “Walkman” – in theory at least. Sony lost the digital music race, however, because they were so entrenched in the old, obsolete model.

The concern with this model, especially when it comes to news media, is a lack of independence between news reporters and technology companies. The technology companies have little interest in due process, transparency, truth. This new model of corporate sponsorship requires a public fund to support journalism and journalists as the constant truth seekers and tellers for society. This fund could easily be a tax on the device makers who directly benefit from the production of high-quality news media. The potential tensions that arise from a publicly funded news industry was resolved decades ago and was further addressed just yesterday by Lee Bollinger, president of Columbia University, in the Wall Street Journal.

Such a media ecosystem is natural and will provide a rich and sustainable canvas for creators to express and consumers to consume.