In the last day or two, as I began to gather my thoughts and feelings about my trip to SXSWi and my planned posts, I had a terrible nagging feeling. One nagging feeling that wasn’t allowing me to write, post video, share some stories, or generally gush about what an incredible trip this had been.

So before I can share those posts, I need to share this one…

I’ll start by saying that there are some incredibly smart, talented and creative people  in the interactive space. Many of whom were scurrying about the Convention Center and streets of Austin this past week. Seriously, if you think that it’s just a bunch of Star Wars fanatics in black t-shirts trying to get to the next level of World of Warcraft or design the next fart noise app for the iPhone, you are mistaken. OK, there are some…but in general these are people that have not only imagined miraculous systems, applications, and tools but they have built the damn things! Many have poured time, money and energy into wondrous systems and services that help you and I access information and communicate with each other in places and ways never seen before.

Now here’s the thing…we’re asking them to not charge us for it? “Thanks for quitting your job, mortgaging the house and living on Ramen noodles. I’ll use the heck out of this (insert web service or app here) to better my business/life. What? It’s going to cost me $10 a year? Oh. Never mind.”

Such is the model of the business of free. This nagging feeling, this little rain cloud on the horizon of this new
world that I’ve fallen in love with, was precipitated by the final
keynote session featuring entrepreneur and marketer Guy Kawasaki and
Wired editor Chris Anderson, author of the forthcoming book “Free”. The
fire was further stoked by a post forwarded to me by my Minnov8
colleague, Graeme Thickins.

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