A Relationship By Any Other Name

People think about relationships as if it were an airline frequent flyer membership card, something that you can renew, something that entitles you to certain privileges, something that justifies acting in a certain way. I don't think that's the most healthy way to go.

I gain comfort in viewing my relationships in a slightly different way.

Relationships are not a club membership, but a hedge fund

People invest in their relationships, especially the ones they want to keep for a long time. However it is folly to believe that all relationships are created equal. Someone you refer to as BFF, might view you as one of his many friends. Also, while relationships slowly build up history, none is a guarantee how the relationship will go in the future. New relationships may take precedence, new conditions and circumstances will appear that take your relationship in different directions.

Viewing relationships as a hedge fund mandates you to look forward to judge future returns, while respecting the happenings of the past. It also prevents you to feel entitled to certain securities, of which there are none. Finally it makes sure everybody takes out of the relationship what they expected, or take a loss. Some relationships people are satisfied with taking a low return over a long period, while others would want high returns in the short term. If you know what you want to achieve here, you can make your investments accordingly.

Make relationships with the group independent from relationships with an individual

It's funny that people can make snap judgments based on association. Discrimination is still the laziest thing people can do to make themselves comfortable, while insulting a whole other group. It can be race, it can be nations, it can be religion, it can be football club.

Viewing the relationship as unique on the individual level, and separating it from any surrounding groups, or even other individuals, is for me the most fair thing to do. It's not that other relationships cannot impact you and yours, but I view them more as market conditions, rather than drivers in the relationship itself. We can work with the market conditions, we cannot change the foundation of the relationship.

Relationships don't need a qualifier

For some reason we always need to qualify the relationships we keep. Whether friends, family, colleagues, competitors, teachers, students, mortal enemies, celebrities, or just some random person, nobody just "is" for anyone.

Bit tragic too, because the way people tend to keep and maintain relationships is the source of many conflicts.

I think the most healthy way of dealing with this, is to view each relationship on its own merits. All relationships have a place in time, and had in their existence inherent value, and I respect each and every single one. I avoid labeling relationships, and tend to stay neutral in my labeling at best. I might not get the highest returns out of it, but at least I'm consistent and at peace. My expected returns and actual returns are very close.

I take my losses, and accept my profits in my relationships. I respect the past, expect fair and realistic returns, and am confident my deals going forward are justifiable, and appropriate.

Consumers Revolt

It used to be the case that people would provide a service, do a performance and pay for the privilege of having it. People buy a ticket to see a movie, purchase a car to drive in it, a record to play it at home.

But I've come to realize this is less and less the case. Consumers do not pay for their content or service anymore. Consumers want the service first, and pay only if it proves its worth.

Maybe it's a trust thing, getting bad service once too many. It may be the economy, so that you are saving your dollar more in anticipation of a rainy day. Even so consumers have reversed the roles with the content provider, the publisher, the artist, the supplier. Consumers are providers themselves of Time.

It's up to the content provider to entice the consumer to give some of that precious Time to him. His content has to be solid, sound, fill a need and a want. To achieve a lower threshold he might give away samples for free. He might use social media to spread the good word about his content. He might make it easier to use the content in a variety of ways. But no longer is the content provider the stronger party in the demand-supply relationship. The content provider is more dependent now on the demand, than the consumer is of the supply. The consumer's Time can be spent a variety of ways, legitimately or otherwise. And if not spent on the content the provider offers, it is spent somewhere else.

So it's best that publishers, artists come to realize that the old ways don't work anymore. It doesn't pay off anymore to hold your content hostage, with DRM, patents, high prizes, region locking and the like. Consumers will find alternative ways to spend their dollar, spend their time. And you can't blame the economy for that.

Copyrights on the stockmarket

I think they should just put copyrights on the stockmarket. Music, movies, books, content in general should just get traded just like stocks, commodities and derivatives. Let the marketplace sort out which content should get sold where and for which price. There would be all kinds of different prizes for selling content once, for multiple viewings, unscheduled viewings, future releases, reboots, as part of compilations, on new devices, all fit to purpose.

Sure it would be more of a hassle than going to itunes or the recordstore, but no more than the stockmarket already is right now.