In the sense of "create more value than you capture", you can also do pretty well for yourself by giving away your by-products. It lets you get the best of both worlds of the "charge money for value" and "influential people on the Internet think everything should be free". (I would assume that would be the point of the Rails example.)
You'd be absolutely amazed how much value you can extract out of a blog, for example, if you treat it as a friendcatcher.
(I love that word -- when I was younger and not exactly the most social of people, Mom always advised me to learn to cook because it was a "friendcatcher". It gives you a perfect built-in excuse to invite people over, even if you've just met them, and cooking and eating are so inherently social that it gets you over the "I don't really know you" hump a lot of the time.)
You'd be absolutely amazed how much value you can extract out of a blog, for example, if you treat it as a friendcatcher.
(I love that word -- when I was younger and not exactly the most social of people, Mom always advised me to learn to cook because it was a "friendcatcher". It gives you a perfect built-in excuse to invite people over, even if you've just met them, and cooking and eating are so inherently social that it gets you over the "I don't really know you" hump a lot of the time.)