The Costco Analogy
Imagine that the Internet is Costco. Costco sells a lot of great things in great quantity. It’s also a great place of friends, dialogue, and community (well, my analogy breaks down a bit here, but stay with me). It also provides free samples. With Costco, it might be a sample of Miss Havendish Tater Tots.* On the internet, it might be a sample of Predator, a quick clip of “Dylan! You SAHNAVABITCH!” Of course, Costco isn’t giving away every tater tot or every Arnold movie for free (although you may find a guy doing that in the alley behind Costco, and that guy needs to be stopped).
SOPA/PIPA essentially says that because Costco is is giving away free samples, it can go in and burn the entire Costco down.
To avoid a lot of this trouble, Costco makes some of its own products (think Trader Joe’s). It’s already having some success. For instance, Costco Fishsticks taste a lot better than Little Belvedere Fishsticks* and cost less. This is bad news for Little Belvedere Fishsticks. Costco Peanuts are pretty good and Planters—an international corporation—is privately angry about this (and also that their product is pretty easy to recreate… it’s pretty hard to screw up a peanut).
What Costco can’t do quite yet is make something the quality of Macallan 12 Scotch. Costco Scotch isn’t there yet. Maybe one day it will be, but at least not today. So right now Costco exists as a hybrid—some self-created products and some great name brand stuff you recognize. The motto becomes “Come for the fishsticks, stay for the Scotch.” That’s the business model that allows Costco/the Internet to thrive and further experiment with Scotch recipes, etc. AND it gives out free samples to get people talking in the store.
But Belvedere Fishsticks and Planters are pissed. They’re being made irrelevant quickly, more quickly than Macallan. They go to the studio that made Predator and get them all riled up about the free samples (when really they need to go after the shady guy in the alley behind Costco). So then all the name-brand products threaten to pull their stuff off the shelves and / or burn the place down.
So Costco will either wither and die because of the destruction of its current hybrid business model, or it will actually be physically destroyed. Those are its two options.
Which sucks, because Costco is a great place.
*This post in no way endorses Little Belvedere Fishsticks or Miss Havendish Tater Tots.
