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Obvious question that’s been asked a million times: who the hell is gonna pay for this web of “documents”? Producing and distributing “documents” costs money; t

by oefrha 7y ago

Obvious question that’s been asked a million times: who the hell is gonna pay for this web of “documents”? Producing and distributing “documents” costs money; this web of “documents” is all well and good for hobbyist stuff (and we do still have a subweb of documents of personal websites) but breaks down when people rely on it to put bread on the table.

WClayFerguson 7y ago
IPFS + FileCoin is currently the 'best attempt' at this and is so far succeeding. It's like a blockchain.
- oefrha 7y ago
  Not it’s not. I need to pay if I want my files pinned and distributed, not unlike traditional hosting, so the costs of content creation and distribution are still on me. Granted if my content is popular I don’t need to distribute as much. It doesn’t solve the monetization problem at all.
  - WClayFerguson 7y ago
    That's right, no single person or organization is going to voluntarily pay for all the storage for all the rest of humanity. No one would suggest that would or should happen, and I'm sure you weren't either. The question is: How do we equitably allow everyone to pay for their OWN storage in a way that doesn't involve selling ADs or selling people's 'information', the way the current Big Tech monopolies do. Disk space is ridiculously cheap nowadays. I can buy enough space to store everything you ever typed in your entire life for $10. So I hope IPFS+FileCoin is successful, and you should to!
    - oefrha 7y ago
      > How do we equitably allow everyone to pay for their OWN storage... People create content in order to make money, not to pay for their own storage. However cheap disk space is it's a cost, not revenue (btw, setting aside disk space, bandwidth is nothing but cheap with cloud providers, and nor is business or home bandwidth depending on the definition of cheap). You're shifting the goalpost.
      - WClayFerguson 7y ago
        In my opinion 99.99999% of the content on the web are created not with some revenue goal in mind (to sell access to it) but in order to share some information openly like a blog, or collaborate and participate in some social network, etc. I mean think of it, you've posted 10000s of things onto the web but you've sold NONE of it right? What I'm advocating for is a way to eliminate the current situation of middle-men in the process (Big Tech firms), because they have a long and proven tack record of manipulating and censoring search results and social media feeds, etc. and banning people for life even. Not only am I advocating for the Web3.0 (as it's called), I'm helping to build it.
qznc 7y ago
The article for not ask for ad-free documents. Admittedly, personalized ads do not work well without Javascript.
- oefrha 7y ago
  The Web of Documents would eliminate subscription models entirely (unless we resort to HTTP Basic Auth), so that leaves non-personalized advertising as you said. Unfortunately that seems to only work when your content has a specific audience that can be profitably targeted without personalization, plus being notable enough so that advertisers suitable for your audience would notice your site and partner with you. Doesn't work for most ad-supported websites if you ask me.
  - Tomte 7y ago
    > Unfortunately that seems to only work when your content has a specific audience Advertisers find general magazines and TV still interesting enough, without any personalization.
    - oefrha 7y ago
      There are way more random internet publications than TV stations/channels and sustainably run physical magazines.
TeMPOraL 7y ago
> but breaks down when people rely on it to put bread on the table. No, it doesn't. It only breaks down when people use the web as a sole and direct means of making money. I.e. baiting people to view ads. Any normal company that does business over the Internet uses the web to present their offering and drive purchases. The web part is funded by proceeds from their actual business. This is entirely compatible with the "web of documents".
radiator 7y ago
Regarding distributing such documents, they are cheaper to distribute than applications. Regarding producing the documents, the author mentions Xanadu as inspiration, and in the linked wikipedia article we find rule 9: "Every document can contain a royalty mechanism at any desired degree of granularity to ensure payment on any portion accessed, including virtual copies ("transclusions") of all or part of the document.". So the idea for a mechanism to allow payments was foreseen. I guess there can also be advertisements, only not personalised. (Edited the Xanadu rule cited)

by oefrha 7y ago

WClayFerguson 7y ago

IPFS + FileCoin is currently the 'best attempt' at this and is so far succeeding. It's like a blockchain.

oefrha 7y ago
Not it’s not. I need to pay if I want my files pinned and distributed, not unlike traditional hosting, so the costs of content creation and distribution are still on me. Granted if my content is popular I don’t need to distribute as much. It doesn’t solve the monetization problem at all.
- WClayFerguson 7y ago
  That's right, no single person or organization is going to voluntarily pay for all the storage for all the rest of humanity. No one would suggest that would or should happen, and I'm sure you weren't either. The question is: How do we equitably allow everyone to pay for their OWN storage in a way that doesn't involve selling ADs or selling people's 'information', the way the current Big Tech monopolies do. Disk space is ridiculously cheap nowadays. I can buy enough space to store everything you ever typed in your entire life for $10. So I hope IPFS+FileCoin is successful, and you should to!
  - oefrha 7y ago
    > How do we equitably allow everyone to pay for their OWN storage... People create content in order to make money, not to pay for their own storage. However cheap disk space is it's a cost, not revenue (btw, setting aside disk space, bandwidth is nothing but cheap with cloud providers, and nor is business or home bandwidth depending on the definition of cheap). You're shifting the goalpost.
    - WClayFerguson 7y ago
      In my opinion 99.99999% of the content on the web are created not with some revenue goal in mind (to sell access to it) but in order to share some information openly like a blog, or collaborate and participate in some social network, etc. I mean think of it, you've posted 10000s of things onto the web but you've sold NONE of it right? What I'm advocating for is a way to eliminate the current situation of middle-men in the process (Big Tech firms), because they have a long and proven tack record of manipulating and censoring search results and social media feeds, etc. and banning people for life even. Not only am I advocating for the Web3.0 (as it's called), I'm helping to build it.

qznc 7y ago

The article for not ask for ad-free documents. Admittedly, personalized ads do not work well without Javascript.

oefrha 7y ago
The Web of Documents would eliminate subscription models entirely (unless we resort to HTTP Basic Auth), so that leaves non-personalized advertising as you said. Unfortunately that seems to only work when your content has a specific audience that can be profitably targeted without personalization, plus being notable enough so that advertisers suitable for your audience would notice your site and partner with you. Doesn't work for most ad-supported websites if you ask me.
- Tomte 7y ago
  > Unfortunately that seems to only work when your content has a specific audience Advertisers find general magazines and TV still interesting enough, without any personalization.
  - oefrha 7y ago
    There are way more random internet publications than TV stations/channels and sustainably run physical magazines.

TeMPOraL 7y ago

> but breaks down when people rely on it to put bread on the table. No, it doesn't. It only breaks down when people use the web as a sole and direct means of making money. I.e. baiting people to view ads. Any normal company that does business over the Internet uses the web to present their offering and drive purchases. The web part is funded by proceeds from their actual business. This is entirely compatible with the "web of documents".

radiator 7y ago

Regarding distributing such documents, they are cheaper to distribute than applications. Regarding producing the documents, the author mentions Xanadu as inspiration, and in the linked wikipedia article we find rule 9: "Every document can contain a royalty mechanism at any desired degree of granularity to ensure payment on any portion accessed, including virtual copies ("transclusions") of all or part of the document.". So the idea for a mechanism to allow payments was foreseen. I guess there can also be advertisements, only not personalised. (Edited the Xanadu rule cited)