When it comes to undoing the traditional marketing model, the shift to a digital economy—where the cost of goods is reduced to virtually zero and services such as Google, Facebook and Wikipedia are offered for free—is having more impact than anything else. Chris Anderson, editor-in-chief at tech magazine Wired, looks at the impact of this economy.

As Anderson points out, there is a paradox here: people are making lots of money out of free services. A simple look at the millionaires made by this model proves his point.

This is a genuinely insightful book, and one that offers more value to marketers thinking about their marketing, pricing and product strategies than any number of pure marketing texts. The author uses quirky examples to illustrate his ideas.

If, like me, you're old enough to remain cynical at the thought of anyone offering something for nothing, this book helps to explain why this new economy is different and why people are indeed apparently happy to offer free services. If you're younger—and like this idea—you might find here reasons to become a little more cynical.