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This is the sad reality behind much of content creation nowadays. Now that everyone's a blogging streaming indie-gamemaking content-spewing machine, the margin

by candu 9y ago

This is the sad reality behind much of content creation nowadays. Now that everyone's a blogging streaming indie-gamemaking content-spewing machine, the marginal expected value of new content - in a lot of areas - is close to zero. Once you factor in the cost of marketing to get noticed above the noise, the financial value you personally realize is often negative. Of course, people will keep trying, because a) it is fundamentally rewarding in some non-monetary sense to make Real Things, and b) there are enough "I quit my job and now I'm a bazillionaire!" stories out there to entice (largely young, less established) people to play the lottery. The real money is in owning the content markets (where you get your cut in developer account subscriptions, transaction fees, 30% of sales, marketing costs, etc.) or in providing tools, just as in the Gold Rush of yore.

zzalpha 9y ago
This is the sad reality behind much of content creation nowadays. Don't be fooled. It's always been this way. In fact, there was a time when content creators didn't get rich at all. If they were lucky they made a living, often due to patronage. Not to mention those who simply inherited or married into wealth. The millionaire artist is a very modern invention.
- MagnumOpus 9y ago
  > The millionaire artist is a very modern invention. I actually wonder how many pre-20th century examples there really are... Artisan artists who made piecemeal works of art - like Rubens, say - could make a comfortable living, but it takes mass media to gain real wealth. I can only think of a handful of fiction writers who got seriously wealthy just from writing alone back then - Charles Dickens, Jules Verne, maybe a few others.
- dkersten 9y ago
  The millionaire artist is a very modern invention. Michelangelo was very wealthy and paid well for his artworks.
  - zzalpha 9y ago
    Yeah, because he had patrons, including Pope Julius II.
eksemplar 9y ago
I don't think things have really changed. The games market is saturated, but the IoT is only just beginning, and the next "minecraft" (sorry I don't know a lot of indie games) will probably be something AR or VR. AR is posing to really take off. I mean, I work for the government and I'm not very creative, so these upcoming things might seem lame to a lot of people, but we can basically cover a 15 km radius with slow "internet" (LoraWAN) for around $1000. In this you can build all sorts of small devices. You can monitor street temperatures and giving the data to the public via open data. You can monitor if elderly people are alive by tracking whether or not an IoT lightbuilb turns on. You can build tourism apps that emit small stories via Bluetooth. I mean, the options are endless, and it's basically shaping up to be the Wild West that indie games were 10 years ago.
- sillysaurus3 9y ago
  AR isn't really going to become a thing. Not with current technology, anyway. The problem is twofold: There's no way to get enough power to the device to do anything interesting, and there's no way to make things darker. You can only add light, not subtract it. That means your AR interface will be basically unreadable in sunlight. The power problem is the real killer, though. Oculus is only successful because it's tethered to a high-end rig. When you don't have that, you're basically tethering a mobile phone to your eyes. Not only do mobile phones die within a few hours if you play 3D games on them continuously, but their graphics aren't very impressive. There's a third problem worth mentioning: When you're using AR, you're making an overlay on the real world. The real world is instant. Your overlay has to be at least 90fps to look seamless. That means you have to recognize a target + render the overlay within 11 milliseconds. That recognition step is a long way from being that performant. I predict Magic Leap will be shown to be an elaborate ruse, and they were able to raise money mostly by tricking investors with tech demos that can't possibly advance any further. It's easy to make this claim, but the fundamental problems with the technology seem insurmountable on our current tech tree. It's not quite the same thing as being negative toward a new startup -- most startups have a chance of succeeding if they get users. But you can't get users with AR without wishing for new advances in technology that seem beyond startups' capabilities for the moment.
MichaelMoser123 9y ago
Minecraft started as an indie game, so this statement is not quite correct.
- snerbles 9y ago
  Citing Minecraft's success is a shining example of survivorship bias, approaching the level of baby-boomers assuring any kid with programming talent that "one day you'll be the next Bill Gates".
  - runevault 9y ago
    Flip side saying "don't make money" is the reverse. Even just "very, very, very rarely" would be a big difference.
- Brockenstein 9y ago
  Yes, Minecraft and dozens of other indie games have been very very successful. But how many indie games were created in just the year Minecraft was released that didn't make much money at all? For every one moderate to major success, you've got hundreds of games, maybe thousands, that didn't make it. One can always believe their game is going to be the next big thing, eventually someone is bound to be right. But pretending like that sort of success is regular and common thing isn't realistic.
gr__or 9y ago
While certainly not the norm, there is also Jonathan Blow who made Braid & The Witness, both afaik full time with borrowed money. Though few people have his vision and resolute. Me, I'm fine with making games on the side for now. But if an idea were to come along which I deeply fall in love with, I can easily imagine quitting my day job (being frugal, always putting on the side helps with that) and just work on something for a few years.

by candu 9y ago

zzalpha 9y ago

This is the sad reality behind much of content creation nowadays. Don't be fooled. It's always been this way. In fact, there was a time when content creators didn't get rich at all. If they were lucky they made a living, often due to patronage. Not to mention those who simply inherited or married into wealth. The millionaire artist is a very modern invention.

MagnumOpus 9y ago
> The millionaire artist is a very modern invention. I actually wonder how many pre-20th century examples there really are... Artisan artists who made piecemeal works of art - like Rubens, say - could make a comfortable living, but it takes mass media to gain real wealth. I can only think of a handful of fiction writers who got seriously wealthy just from writing alone back then - Charles Dickens, Jules Verne, maybe a few others.
dkersten 9y ago
The millionaire artist is a very modern invention. Michelangelo was very wealthy and paid well for his artworks.
- zzalpha 9y ago
  Yeah, because he had patrons, including Pope Julius II.

eksemplar 9y ago

I don't think things have really changed. The games market is saturated, but the IoT is only just beginning, and the next "minecraft" (sorry I don't know a lot of indie games) will probably be something AR or VR. AR is posing to really take off. I mean, I work for the government and I'm not very creative, so these upcoming things might seem lame to a lot of people, but we can basically cover a 15 km radius with slow "internet" (LoraWAN) for around $1000. In this you can build all sorts of small devices. You can monitor street temperatures and giving the data to the public via open data. You can monitor if elderly people are alive by tracking whether or not an IoT lightbuilb turns on. You can build tourism apps that emit small stories via Bluetooth. I mean, the options are endless, and it's basically shaping up to be the Wild West that indie games were 10 years ago.

sillysaurus3 9y ago
AR isn't really going to become a thing. Not with current technology, anyway. The problem is twofold: There's no way to get enough power to the device to do anything interesting, and there's no way to make things darker. You can only add light, not subtract it. That means your AR interface will be basically unreadable in sunlight. The power problem is the real killer, though. Oculus is only successful because it's tethered to a high-end rig. When you don't have that, you're basically tethering a mobile phone to your eyes. Not only do mobile phones die within a few hours if you play 3D games on them continuously, but their graphics aren't very impressive. There's a third problem worth mentioning: When you're using AR, you're making an overlay on the real world. The real world is instant. Your overlay has to be at least 90fps to look seamless. That means you have to recognize a target + render the overlay within 11 milliseconds. That recognition step is a long way from being that performant. I predict Magic Leap will be shown to be an elaborate ruse, and they were able to raise money mostly by tricking investors with tech demos that can't possibly advance any further. It's easy to make this claim, but the fundamental problems with the technology seem insurmountable on our current tech tree. It's not quite the same thing as being negative toward a new startup -- most startups have a chance of succeeding if they get users. But you can't get users with AR without wishing for new advances in technology that seem beyond startups' capabilities for the moment.

MichaelMoser123 9y ago

Minecraft started as an indie game, so this statement is not quite correct.

snerbles 9y ago
Citing Minecraft's success is a shining example of survivorship bias, approaching the level of baby-boomers assuring any kid with programming talent that "one day you'll be the next Bill Gates".
- runevault 9y ago
  Flip side saying "don't make money" is the reverse. Even just "very, very, very rarely" would be a big difference.
Brockenstein 9y ago
Yes, Minecraft and dozens of other indie games have been very very successful. But how many indie games were created in just the year Minecraft was released that didn't make much money at all? For every one moderate to major success, you've got hundreds of games, maybe thousands, that didn't make it. One can always believe their game is going to be the next big thing, eventually someone is bound to be right. But pretending like that sort of success is regular and common thing isn't realistic.

gr__or 9y ago

While certainly not the norm, there is also Jonathan Blow who made Braid & The Witness, both afaik full time with borrowed money. Though few people have his vision and resolute. Me, I'm fine with making games on the side for now. But if an idea were to come along which I deeply fall in love with, I can easily imagine quitting my day job (being frugal, always putting on the side helps with that) and just work on something for a few years.