3 ms·

I have similar sentiments; I wonder if there's any future for paid, curated content given society's invention and use of pejorative terms (paywalls!) for publis

I have similar sentiments; I wonder if there's any future for paid, curated content given society's invention and use of pejorative terms (paywalls!) for publishers who restrict their content to paid subscribers. It's not like we were just paying for the ink and paper back in 1993.

CM30 8y ago
Hard to say. There's definitely a future for curated content; Hacker News, Reddit etc are basically that. As are numerous newsletters, blog articles and videos listing interesting or underrated resources and creators. Charging for that seems like it could theoretically work, though the key would be that you'd have to A: have a solid audience in mind who'd be likely to consider decent curation valuable enough to pay for and B: be extremely good at selecting resources to show people, to the point there's no way in hell they could find all the stuff shown off themselves. It'd be a challenge, but I think it could be possible. Hell, I think something like this could probably work quite well in the SEO or digital marketing world, just because of how much bullshit there is online and how hard it can be to find the good stuff.
- pandesmos 8y ago
  This sounds like reinventing the focused arty magazine/technical journal almost.
- AstralStorm 8y ago
  Are they really curated? What they actually are is a reflection of community of people inhabiting then, posting and upvoting. Being a curator implies a degree of objectivity and skill more than getting votes. Including building a cohesive whole.
tomc1985 8y ago
I'm thinking more of Youtube, or Instagram, which dramatically lowered the cost of publishing visual media, or Spotify and other digital download stores, which helped make the cost of publishing music almost nothing (Tunecore, etc). Youtube in particular seems to be flooded with crap
- malvosenior 8y ago
  Youtube is filled with amazing content. You can learn how to do almost anything by watching Youtube videos. It's probably the most amazing content library created in all of human history. Would you really rather go back to "57 channels and nothing on"? More Emeril and Wheel of Fortune?
  - ams6110 8y ago
    It's both. There's lots of great stuff on YouTube and there's lots of crap on YouTube. I think the same was true with record stores, bookstores, and libraries in the physical world.
    - AstralStorm 8y ago
      Specialty libraries do get curated by librarians who are at least versed in the subject matter. Not sure about general ones, probably too. That's the difference between archives and libraries.
MrEldritch 8y ago
I've heard a theory that the very idea of paid, curated media content was kind of a relatively recent invention, and that what we're seeing is just the move back to the same model that had previously funded art of all kinds throughout history - patronage. (Or to be precise: Patreonage.) I've seen a lot of people discovering that Patreon-model support can be way more successful for them than ad support. People don't like to pay for free shit - in the age of Zero Marginal Cost, paying for digital goods always makes me feel like a bit of a sucker, but I suck it up and do it because I don't want to break the incentive structure by not rewarding the creator for their work. And I do want the creator to be rewarded. Divorcing the two - giving out free stuff, and also providing a way to directly toss someone a continuing stream of money to help them make this stuff based on how much I value making that happen - would seem to be the perfect compromise.

CM30 8y ago

Hard to say. There's definitely a future for curated content; Hacker News, Reddit etc are basically that. As are numerous newsletters, blog articles and videos listing interesting or underrated resources and creators. Charging for that seems like it could theoretically work, though the key would be that you'd have to A: have a solid audience in mind who'd be likely to consider decent curation valuable enough to pay for and B: be extremely good at selecting resources to show people, to the point there's no way in hell they could find all the stuff shown off themselves. It'd be a challenge, but I think it could be possible. Hell, I think something like this could probably work quite well in the SEO or digital marketing world, just because of how much bullshit there is online and how hard it can be to find the good stuff.

pandesmos 8y ago
This sounds like reinventing the focused arty magazine/technical journal almost.
AstralStorm 8y ago
Are they really curated? What they actually are is a reflection of community of people inhabiting then, posting and upvoting. Being a curator implies a degree of objectivity and skill more than getting votes. Including building a cohesive whole.

tomc1985 8y ago

I'm thinking more of Youtube, or Instagram, which dramatically lowered the cost of publishing visual media, or Spotify and other digital download stores, which helped make the cost of publishing music almost nothing (Tunecore, etc). Youtube in particular seems to be flooded with crap

malvosenior 8y ago
Youtube is filled with amazing content. You can learn how to do almost anything by watching Youtube videos. It's probably the most amazing content library created in all of human history. Would you really rather go back to "57 channels and nothing on"? More Emeril and Wheel of Fortune?
- ams6110 8y ago
  It's both. There's lots of great stuff on YouTube and there's lots of crap on YouTube. I think the same was true with record stores, bookstores, and libraries in the physical world.
  - AstralStorm 8y ago
    Specialty libraries do get curated by librarians who are at least versed in the subject matter. Not sure about general ones, probably too. That's the difference between archives and libraries.

MrEldritch 8y ago

I've heard a theory that the very idea of paid, curated media content was kind of a relatively recent invention, and that what we're seeing is just the move back to the same model that had previously funded art of all kinds throughout history - patronage. (Or to be precise: Patreonage.) I've seen a lot of people discovering that Patreon-model support can be way more successful for them than ad support. People don't like to pay for free shit - in the age of Zero Marginal Cost, paying for digital goods always makes me feel like a bit of a sucker, but I suck it up and do it because I don't want to break the incentive structure by not rewarding the creator for their work. And I do want the creator to be rewarded. Divorcing the two - giving out free stuff, and also providing a way to directly toss someone a continuing stream of money to help them make this stuff based on how much I value making that happen - would seem to be the perfect compromise.