With the drool-inducing i-pad being officially announced this week, the spotlight (on it’s way to Apple HQ, admittedly) stopped once again on the publishing industry, and questions were asked once again about what impact ebook readers will have on the publishing houses. Digital media and distribution has certainly changed the face of the music and film industry, and it seems there are strong opinions all round as to whether books, newspapaers and magazines will see prices plummet and margins erode.
Which delivers the best information; the ipad or your lawyer?
It got me musing about the value of information, and what people will pay for. In the world of newspapers, the news itself, in terms of factual reporting, is widely available (in a variety of different media formats) for free. However, people will still happily pay for good quality analysis, or more in depth reporting. To my mind, this is someone, somewhere, taking the baseline information and using their skill and experience to add value to it. The economist magazine is a great example of this. Well thought through, detailed analysis from a good variety of authors.
The parallel with the legal profession is strong. Not too long ago, the information used by lawyers was itself a closely guarded secret. Protective regulation was wrapped around the profession, providing a barrier to the general public (whether individuals or organisations) getting their hands, or eyes, on it. Unless you’d got the qualifications and were members of the appropriate bar or law society, accessing the pure information that forms the backbone of the law was difficult and/or expensive. Then, along with deregulation, came the icy wind of the Internet, and made the a huge proportion of the law available easily and free (or at least cheaply).
So what then of the lawyer? Well the lawyer, to my mind, adds some value to the information by applying it to a particular set of circumstances. But that’s just table stakes these days. To really add value, the lawyer needs to understand the wider business or personal context that the client operates in. He or she needs to think creatively (sadly, still not a word often associated with lawyers) to create solutions to problems or innovative ways of achieving success. Finally, and there is another strong parallel with the economist magazine here, the lawyer needs to communicate the advice (ie the information plus the added value content) in a way that is clear, concise and easy to understand.
Conclusions; much like the printed word, I think there will be winners and losers. Those people and organisations that can take the widely available, free information, and add some real value, will continue to thrive. Those that can’t and try and sell a product or service that is little more than what’s available for free, will go the way of audio cassette. And let’s be honest, no-one misses those, do they?
The Intelligent Challenge 
Great post Mark and so very true – there are great parallels between these areas and health….people have access to more ‘bits’ or should I say ‘bytes’ of health related information courtesy of the web and more self-help publications. However, people often don’t sit down and work out the bottom line of how much they may have spent on such publications, supplements, over the counter medications, herbal remedies, online subscription-self-helps etc (often over many years for chronic conditions)….and they may still suffer.
Without calling upon the skills of someone who dedicates their time to investigation the root of the root of their suffering, transforming their disease becomes less likely.
A slightly cheesy analogy but it gives you an idea: it’s important for a person to know how their business is doing financially, but without having an accountant for their wisdom and expertise to illuminate the bits that really matter, one becomes a bookkeeping firefighter, attracting a greater likelyhood of persistent minor, unnecessary costs that over time may take it’s toll on the business itself.
I’d rather not be that audio cassette….!
I’d not thought about the concept in those terms but you make an interesting point. I suspect the concept holds true for a broad number of knowledge workers.