The Autopian's been doing pretty well with it, too. I think there's two things interacting here that make this more tractable than first impressions - first is

The Autopian's been doing pretty well with it, too. I think there's two things interacting here that make this more tractable than first impressions - first is that the cost of running one of these sites as a sustainable business is a hell of a lot lower than whatever crazy shit the PE & hedge funders were pushing for. I also think people's willingness to pay for quality content is higher than has been assumed, and I think part of that is a lot of us have seen what the cost of free content is over the last couple years. I think you're right that these sites will never be more than niche by subscriber count, but I think there's more appetite now than before and I think it's entirely possible to make a sustainable business here. I'm also generally in favor of a world where writers and creators get paid a decent wage to write and create things I find valuable or interesting, so I'm biased here.