Beginning of Essay
Today, no matter what you do, you need money to do it. Right? Right! Shop. Travel. Make a phone call. You even need to spend money in order to make money. Money is real. People seem to be under the assumption that information wants to be free and that by enabling ....

Middle of Essay
.... and basically one big fantasy. No, dollars are utterly and entirely real, far more real than anything as vague as the public interest. If you're not a commodity, you don't exist! Of course there are many elements of our lives that exist outside the money economy. There's a lot going on in our lives that's not-for-profit and that can't be denominated in dollars. "The best things in life are free," the old saying goes. Nice old saying. Gets a little older-sounding every day. Sounds about as old and mossy as the wedding vow "for richer for poorer," which in a modern environment is pretty likely to be for-richer-or poorer following our prenuptial agreemen ....