Upon reading, "Giving Up Control in the Era of Open Business" (http://www.elsua.net/2013/09/03/giving-up-control-in-the-era-of-open-business/), one of the suggested readings for LRNT502 - Intro to Research, I am compelled to make some comments on the topic covered by the article. 
In this day and age of instant gratification, it is certainly no wonder that people not only require but also expect practically unlimited access to information - information of any kind, whether it be academic research and commentary, music, the latest news and gossip, films, TV shows. you name it! And the medium clearly exists to accommodate this need - the internet. And this need is completely understandable. 
We have been fed media at such a constant and relentless rate in the past twenty years that it is no wonder we are behaving as addicts: We need it. All the time. Every day. We crave it. And, like the addict, we will do whatever it takes to get that satisfaction, including pretending that copyright is not a real law. In a veritable sea of free information (and I use that word lightly, as nothing is really free), it is hard for people to see the value of intellectual property. And, like the addict, we will make self-justifications in order to enable our addiction. 
These self-justifications, in response to old-school criticism, take on many forms: "Well, he has made millions off that recording. How is my downloading it from a peer-to-peer site hurting him?" or " I just want to watch the crappy version of that new movie on my laptop to see if I like it and then I'll pay to go see the real thing." or "It's just a book? What's the big deal? I can go to a library and read it, why can't I just download the PDF to my device?" or "I'm just a poor student! I can't afford to pay to read this research!" and so on and so on.
Young, K. S. (1999), lists in her article, "Internet Addiction: symptoms, evaluation and treatment", a series of questions asked to participants in a study on internet addiction. They are as follows:

 1. Do you feel preoccupied with the Internet (think about previous on-line activity or anticipate next on-line session)?

2. Do you feel the need to use the Internet with increasing amounts of time in order to achieve satisfaction?

3. Have you repeatedly made unsuccessful efforts to control, cut back, or stop Internet use?

4. Do you feel restless, moody, depressed, or irritable when attempting to cut down or stop Internet use?

5. Do you stay on-line longer than originally intended?

6. Have you jeopardized or risked the loss of significant relationship, job, educational or

career opportunity because of the Internet?

7. Have you lied to family members, therapist, or others to conceal the extent of involvement with the Internet?

8. Do you uses the Internet as a way of escaping from problems or of relieving a dysphoric

mood (e.g., feelings of helplessness, guilt, anxiety, depression)? 

These are derived from a similar series of questions asked to a group of people suffering from pathological gambling. And we all know that gambling establishments exonerate themselves simply by posting signage reminding people that gambling is addictive and providing help services to deal with such addiction. However, this does nothing to solve the source of the problem: access.

So one of the key issues here would seem to be that, without access to media, people would not be so prone to view it as a free commodity, there for their use at any time, without much thought for any implications of its use. But how can we police the internet? It is impossible. So we provide and in fact, as users, pay for, the very medium that causes the problem. And do so willingly. If, indeed, there is no escape from this environment, then how do we go about enticing the user to realize the value of intellectual property? 

Kevin Spacey recently gave a talk regarding film piracy, coming from the perspective of an actor/producer who had just completed a full season of "House of Cards", a Netflix original series. He states the following after describing the release of the entire first season at once and that Netflix was the only network willing to allow them for go ahead full-force with production, without requiring a pilot first:

“And through this new form of distribution, we have demonstrated that we have learned the lesson the music industry didn’t learn: give people what they want, when they want it, in the form they want it and at a reasonable price and they’ll more likely pay for it rather than steal it."

Interesting. If you give the user choice and ultimately control, as the article "Giving Up Control in the Era of Open Business" points out, suddenly the consumer will pay a nominal fee to access it. So perhaps allowing the media-addict to have some sort of control over their own addiction  may be a solution. Most surely, the internet is not going anywhere. And the consumer will always do just that: consume. So if businesses, academic institutions, etc took the route of "yes go ahead and take it all, but for a small fee", in an effort of capitalize on this media-addiction, the landscape might evolve to a point where people don't simply take it because they can, but instead, take it because they feel some sense of shared ownership in terms of the intellectual property. That view would initiate a serious paradigm shift, in the world of academia in particular. You do the work but we all own it. Imagine a million readers giving you a penny each to download your research. Do the math. Ten grand. And who would miss a penny? Could you live off it? Probably not. But most researchers are not living off their research findings, are they? Given that so many are uploading research now for free, or for the exposure (you can die of exposure, by the way!), maybe a model such as this will work.

I will be very curious to see how the next decade evolves in terms of the online, media addicted consumer! There's only one  thing I know for certain: The article I read is correct, and so is Kevin Spacey and others: if you don't put the control into the hands of the consumers, you will not survive the coming age.

 

                                                                   References
Young, K. S. (1999). Internet addiction: symptoms, evaluation and treatment. Innovations in clinical practice: A source book, 17, 19-31.