Information Wants to Be Free

“Information wants to be free.” — Stewart Brand, 1984

But Brand said more than that. The full quote is rarely repeated:

“Information wants to be free. Information also wants to be expensive. That tension will not go away.”

Free as in available. Expensive as in valuable. The entire history of the internet lives inside that contradiction — open source vs. paywalls, wikis vs. subscriptions, the commons vs. the platform.