Tuesday, January 29, 2013

This Year's Model

What does Kim Dotcom have in common with Gareth Morgan, apart from wealth and the tendency to over-stretch their public personas? Today, it would happen to be Oatmeal and Dinosaurs.

While fundraising for a Tesla Museum last year, indie webcomic Matthew "Oatmeal" Inman offered to prostitute his blog if anyone donated over 33K. Putting his faith and charity into the wisdom of crowds, he ended up plugging a Dinosaur Museum run by people who wouldn't look out of place in a live-action South Park episode.

Native dinosaur lobbyist Gareth Morgan could learn a thing or two about trusting the people instead of whacking them on the head with hyperbole. Kim Dotcom's latest business model is shown up in stark contrast as merely a dark mirror to Big Media's IP-ploitation model, as Russell Brown has pointed out.

Oatmeal provides a fairer business model than either of these larger than life characters. The future lies in Trust, Tolerance and Toons. And not a corporate pimp in sight.