ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the problematic nature of information and to propose an extension of economic theory that may help to resolve some of the quandaries and apparent paradoxes which currently hamper economic considerations of information in the field of communication. It deals with an examination and consideration of the economic value of information. Information has proved to be a problematic concept for economic theory. Economists, as a rule, have failed to make the extreme statement, although they have noted often that information violates some features generally attributed to consumer. There have been many considerations of the value of information, across several disciplines, mostly focusing on utility value. The use of expected value enables the analyst to treat the value of information goods as fixed. The peculiar nature of information would seem to make the other potential sources of value, which are often ignored in theoretical analyses, of greater import for information goods than for more traditional economic goods.
