The scarcity of time and energy... (or ability)

It seems the cost of current information consumers/user is not only about the monetary cost but also the cost of time and energy. If the cost of searching information is lower (fewer time, easier subscription procedure, clearer or well-organized interface, etc), it's more attractive for people to pay a bit than totally free to use the information.

The cost of searching and full understanding the information also plays significant role in the free information aspect. In making political voting decision, most relatively uninformed people may use information shortcuts (require little effort to acquire information) such as friends, coworkers, political parties, and other groups to gain brief and simple idea of certain policy and to make their decision rather than fully understand what does the policy contain.

The other thing is about the inferior goods theory that Iris mentioned in class. The labels fear the "channel conflict" of cheaper MP3 downloading and the decreased sells of CD; however, will the consumers are still willing to pay more according to the inferior goods theory? To what extent the pricing distance between the inferior goods and the superior goods will affect each other?