In 2004 the web got personal, and a company gave away a gigabyte to prove a point.
2004: Facebook launched from a dorm room, and Gmail arrived offering a full gigabyte of free storage when rivals offered a few megabytes. On Mars, Spirit and Opportunity began exploring a planet that was becoming a place rather than a distant point of light.
In 2004 two things told you where the wind was going. Facebook started in a dorm room, and Gmail launched offering a whole gigabyte of storage for free, when everyone else was rationing a few megabytes.
The Gmail move stuck with me most. It was generosity as strategy: give people so much more than they expect that they cannot go back.
I have tried to run that play ever since. Abundance beats scarcity almost every time, because scarcity is a tax on your own customer, and someone will always show up willing to drop the tax.