Seth's Blog: Compared to perfect: the price/value mismatch in content
"How's the wine?" You really can't answer that question out of context. Compared to what? Compared to a hundred dollar bottle? Not so good. Compared to any other $12 bottle... great! "How was the hotel?" "How's the service at the post office?" In just about all the decisions we make, we consider the price. A shipper doesn't expect the same level of service quality from a first class letter delivery than it does from an overnight international courier service. Of course not. And yet... A quick analysis of the top 100 titles on Amazon (movies, books, music, doesn't matter what) shows zero correlation between the price and the reviews. (I didn't do the math, but you're welcome to... might be a good science fair entry). Try to imagine a similar disconnect if the subject was cars or clothing... For any other good or service, the value of a free alternative that was any good would be infinite--free airplane ticke...