Free Fallin'

Malcolm Gladwell observes in this week's New Yorker:

A recent report by Credit Suisse estimates that YouTube’s bandwidth costs in 2009 will be three hundred and sixty million dollars. In the case of YouTube, the effects of technological Free [i.e., extremely low-cost digital infrastructure] and psychological Free [i.e., the robust, irrational consumer impulse to desire "free" stuff] work against each other.

[YouTube] tries to sell advertisements alongside its videos. The problem is that the videos attracted by psychological Free —pirated material, cat videos, and other forms of user-generated content—are not the sort of thing that advertisers want to be associated with. In order to sell advertising, YouTube has had to buy the rights to professionally produced content, such as television shows and movies. Credit Suisse put the cost of those licenses in 2009 at roughly two hundred and sixty million dollars.... Credit Suisse estimates that YouTube will lose close to half a billion dollars this year. If it were a bank, it would be eligible for TARP funds....

It's true. But beside the point for now. For behold- free non-fuzzy, only moderately-compressed Boulez with Chicago symphony.