This Christmas, as has been the case for the better part of a decade, my children wanted the same thing in their stockings. I-Tunes gift cards so they could buy music, since in my family we tend not to steal it. They have also spent their own money on music, and by now, bit by bit, this has added up to a considerable amount of money. This Christmas it suddenly occurred to me: what exactly had I bought? What exactly do they now own, and for how long? When I was their age and purchased vinyl records, I owned whatever was on them for as long as the vinyl lasted. When I purchased music on compact discs, I was promised a “lifetime” of listening. What about now?
What about e-books? What about videos? What about electronic magazine and newspaper articles? What about family photos, if they exist only in the so-called cloud, off on a server somewhere? With the typical person lasting longer than the typical business firm, what guarantees are there? And from whom?
Saying the Unsaid in New York 