http://slyoyster.com

I love strawberry jam, either on toast and vanilla ice cream or listening to Animal Collective.? Still, there is nothing that bests the taste of fresh strawberry jam.? I’ve got a freezer full of it right now to last me through the winter.? Spending $30 to pick strawberries this summer and then turn it into jam is an excellent investment.

According to Science Daily, strawberry jam is more heavily regulated than cigarettes due largely to the US government’s strict requirements and stringent tests of consumer products.? Crazy.? The article goes on to argue that because tobacco kills more people each year and proposes a higher risk to people it should be regulated as strictly as strawberry jam.

“The establishment of regulation is a political process and occurs slowly. However, with the gradual but prolonged and massive epidemic of tobacco-related diseases, regulation of the industry?s products ? specifically the constituents of tobacco smoke ? has to begin now?, says author Dr. Nigel Gray, member of the World Health Organization?s (WHO) Tobacco Regulation Study Group.? Which, I’m sure it won’t.

For whatever reason most industries hate regulation.? They see it as meddling.? Whether it’s the auto makers who resisted raising CAFE standards, most industries should do a better job of policing themselves.? You think the companies in Detroit are wishing they made more gas efficient cars beginning five years ago now?? Regardless, cigarette companies should heed the advice and begin regulating their products now.

I say this, not as some liberal who is overstepping their boundaries, but as someone who sees the governments jihad against tobacco and the writing on the wall.? Look, if the government had it’s way cigarettes would all but disappear.? The best way to stave off being eliminated as a business is to make a safer, better product (however safe you can with cigarettes).

Look at the writing on the wall and adapt.

Could Radiohead have signalled the future zero price point of business?? I know, I know, they actually wanted you to pay something for In Rainbows and most folks did.? However, this was the first time the mainstream took note that something could possibly cost nothing.

Wired examines why $0.00 is the future of business. ? It’s a very long article, but a fascinating read, for anyone who is interesting in this sort of thing.? Because of the egalitarian nature of the internet, it’s forced companies to find new ways to market themselves and stand out from the crowded field.

But until recently, practically everything “free” was really just the result of what economists would call a cross-subsidy: You’d get one thing free if you bought another, or you’d get a product free only if you paid for a service.

Over the past decade, however, a different sort of free has emerged. The new model is based not on cross-subsidies ? the shifting of costs from one product to another ? but on the fact that the cost of products themselves is falling fast. It’s as if the price of steel had dropped so close to zero that King Gillette could give away both razor and blade, and make his money on something else entirely. (Shaving cream?)

You know this freaky land of free as the Web. A decade and a half into the great online experiment, the last debates over free versus pay online are ending. In 2007 The New York Times went free; this year, so will much of The Wall Street Journal.