Lawyers are usually archaeologists. They ask: what happened? When? By who and why? Sometimes lawyers are futurists. They ask: what's changing? What are the patterns and trends? Are there statistics in support?

Intellectual property lawyers whose fees depend on advisory work, not litigation, are often futurists. Clauses in contracts which prepare for future events include those for royalties, accounts auditing, dispute resolution, and non-competition. In Hollywood IP lawyers often become talent agents and studio heads. You get the drift.

"Future sickness" is an expression I've coined. It affects those who dwell so much in the future that they virtually live in it. Their regular thoughts, reading habits or advice is about change, a topic which is inherently unstable, hence causing symptoms much like sea sickness. 

But when the future arrives in a rush, intellectual property futurists feel much better. Predicting change becomes easier, the patterns clearer, almost making it feel like standing on solid land.

Future sickness reduced last week in Australia. Three events provided a remedy.

First, Sydney talkback radio icon, John Laws, announced his retirement after more than 50 years in radio. Fellow broadcaster and commentator, Philip Adams, judged Laws' populist tendency and pulled no punches in a column in The Weekend Australian. It's a must read. A rare example of plain speak.

Second, Gerald Stone, aged 73, and the first producer of the Channel Nine 60 Minutes television news commentary program, had his latest book published. It is titled Who killed Channel Nine? (Macmillan Australia, $45.00). What a brilliant title! But personally in this case I'd rather read about the future.

Going that way, current television top dog network, Channel Seven, announced it has a deal in place with commercial free-to-air television networks for use of electronic program material in its forthcoming release of its local TiVo offering. This third event, takes a significant step forward on the the topic discussed in DVRs and video on demand in Australia.

It would be an exaggeration, and plain wrong, to say that these three signs of the changing of the local media guard are caused by the Internet grabbing advertising dollars. Yet like the Brazilian butterfly it is creating a degree of chaos (future sickness?) in media land. With each flutter the wind direction becomes clearer. The wind is saying "Think digital, think future proofing"

To reflect on the times which are a changing and the blowing of the wind, flashback almost a quarter of a century to 1983. I was preparing a contract in my office in North Ryde. It was a book publishing contract for Angus & Robertson Publishers (A&R was owned then, and still is, by News Corp). The book was titled, Sixty Minutes The Book.

It used a new business model. It started a then new trend in Australian publishing - a coffee table, non-fiction work, published with a massive first print run (I think all up the print run was 60,000), plugged heavily with television marketing, and (if my memory serves me well) released for Christmas for gift book sales.

Maybe two-thirds sold for the regular price, the rest were remaindered. Financially the numbers worked. The business model worked. More of that style of publishing followed from A&R.

One very experienced A&R colleague captured my critique and sentiment about the book in a word - she said 60 Minutes The Book was a "non-book". This was the term used at A&R when a book had no traditional book-like substance or quality. Another proof-reading colleague, I recall, whipped back "it pays our wages!"

Back then Gerald Stone and Channel Nine were heavy-hitters. Stone had been the first executive producer of the 60 Minutes TV program. John Laws was even bigger then than now and Angus & Robertson was a publisher of his books of poems. These too, paid our wages.

Richard Walsh, my boss of the time and the publisher at A&R, would often point out that only about 10% of the population were regular book buyers and book readers.

It's easy to be elitist about public tastes and populists like John Laws. I'm sure Philip Adams would agree that it's harder to find a voice to reach a wide audience and be both commercially and creatively successful.

As the sun sets on the radio career of an Australian media icon, John Laws, and an iconic television network goes into damage control mode, it will be exciting to see the emergence on the media and Web landscape of new talent capable of capturing the magic of commercial and creative success.

In their digital future the challenge is to find programs that combine technological functionality, good program design and sound economics in their business model. That's what The war for Internet talent is about. Where the digital younger generations go, the law and wired intellectual property lawyers are already following.