COPYCENSE

“For a 41-year-old investment portfolio manager in Manhattan, the Web site with the whimsical name made perfect sense. Like many Americans, she found herself awash in CD’s, DVD’s and VHS tapes that were seldom if ever played anymore. They just took up valuable space in the Upper West Side apartment where she lives with her husband and two young children.

“Then a friend of a friend told her about Zunafish, a new Web site that matches people with discs and tapes to trade — and video games and paperback books, too. The site, which looks remarkably similar to a prototype Mr. Bloom sketched on notebook paper four years ago with Mr. Elias, trades only one-for-one items within the same category — CD’s, DVD’s, VHS tapes, video games, audio books or paperback books. No item is worth more than any another.

“Traders using the site determine the relative value of an item by choosing to swap or not. No one is ever forced to make a trade.”

Michel Marriott. Read It? Watched It? Swap It. The New York Times. April 13, 2006.

CopyCense™: K. Matthew Dames on the law, business, and technology of digital content. A business venture of Seso Digital LLC.