The Digital Economy ANNIVERSARY EDITION: Rethinking Promise and Peril in the Age of Networked Intelligence, 2nd Edition

20th Anniversary Edition Commentary on Chapter 1: The Age of Networked Intelligence

IT WAS APPROPRIATE that the first chapter of The Digital Economy began with a story about the band R.E.M. and how they used the Internet to promote themselves, and then speculate about how the entire music industry would be turned on its head. For if there is one industry that seemed to take forever to understand the disruptive force of the digital revolution it has been the music labels. With their heads in the sand for almost two decades, they viewed the Internet as a threat rather than the biggest opportunity to come along in their history. The record companies continue to cling belligerently to their old business model, where music is a physical product, ...