Comment by jwr

Comment by jwr 8 hours ago

> content creators are compensated for their work

I have a gut feeling that we've been tricked (by ad companies) into thinking that this is somehow realistic and that casual "content creators" can get meaningful money from us reading their articles.

Realistically, while professional content creators can make a living, writing a blog post every once in a while will not provide meaningful income. Instead of trying to "monetize" everything, we would be better off with free content like on the internet of old. There are other means of making money.

It seems that the current situation means that the "content creators" earn insignificant money, while ad companies earn huge money because of scale, and we all somehow keep believing that this is necessary for content to appear.

Buttons840 8 hours ago

You mean I shouldn't make a comfortable living off my valuable HN comments? I was about to consider this comment a good days work. Maybe if I put this comment on my own webpage it would be more valuable?

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FireBeyond 7 hours ago

> writing a blog post every once in a while will not provide meaningful income

Nor, generally, should it. Sitting down one or two Saturday afternoons a month to write a blog post shouldn't be generating the income of a FTE.

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chiefalchemist 7 hours ago

Allow me a second to play Devil’s Advocate.
What if it could? Or should (be able to produce FTE or close income)?
In that world, the amount of pointless shite - questing to “go viral” - would be reduced to near zero. That is, if the incentive were more quality, and less quantity, we’d be better off, yes?

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- sfink 5 hours ago
  
  That's tempting, but I still don't think it should. There would still be the quest to go viral. "Quality" would still be determined in the aggregate, which means that your income depends on appealing to the widest audience possible, which means high quality niche bloggers still don't get paid much.
  Metrics are hard. Just making sure they reward one particular desired outcome doesn't mean you'll escape the unintended consequences.
  Also, note that we are past the point of being able to reasonably able to manage any of this. Today, you'd need to come up with a reward function that cannot be maximized by AI. (And lest you think you can fix that by using site visitors to evaluate, most of them will be bots too.)
  
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- FireBeyond 7 hours ago
  
  So there's an element of truth to that. And there are those who can contribute enough value, have enough audience, etc., that they can "coast" on those 2 blog posts a month and make significant income...
  ... but that's also not, nor should it be the median. I'm not sure how the economy functions if, say 8h/mo effort generates a median living wage.
  
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  o11c 6 hours ago
  
  Tbf in a post-scarcity society, that should be expected, if historical inertia doesn't prevent it.
  
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