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Kind of related to this mentality, perhaps: On Sam Harris's most recent episode of "Making Sense" with TED's Chris Anderson[0] he shared a Reddit conversation h

Kind of related to this mentality, perhaps: On Sam Harris's most recent episode of "Making Sense" with TED's Chris Anderson[0] he shared a Reddit conversation he came across where people were discussing whether or not they subscribe, i.e., pay, for his podcast: >> I spectated upon this [Reddit] thread, something around "Do you support Sam's podcast and and you if do, why or why not?" and someone said "Well I would support the podcast if I knew what he was going to do with the money" and another person said "Well I would support the podcast if I knew how much it cost to run a podcast" and another person said "I would support the podcast if I knew how much I thought a person should earn from a podcast" and I looked at those three statements and my head practically fell off my shoulders, because I realized at a glance there was something deeply wrong here because these are the kinds of considerations that would never have occurred to a person when they were thinking about buying my next book. I mean there's literally no person on Earth who's ever thought the thought "Well I would buy his next book if I knew how much I thought an author should make from writing books" or "I would buy his next book if I knew what he was going to do with the money." These are just not the kinds of thoughts people think. Either you want to read the book or you don't and you buy it or not. [1] [0]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cCl-5vC7aW8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cCl-5vC7aW8 [1]https://youtu.be/cCl-5vC7aW8?si=CqRcQ-kLUF7JMyXg&t=3604 https://youtu.be/cCl-5vC7aW8?si=CqRcQ-kLUF7JMyXg&t=3604

swozey 3y ago
What even is that? Just straight up entitlement? Ignorance to the situation? Just not caring? He has a great point, I can't think of any times I've ever asked those questions unless I thought the book author was grifting, where I'd go "Oh they're dog whistling to their flock for sales." I never thought "I hope mac miller doesn't use this $20 for drugs" buying mac miller albums..
- jeegsy 3y ago
  That's the question isn't it? If its entitlement as you say, why feel it with a podcast and not books?
CoastalCoder 3y ago
I might understand the moral reasoning here. Here's my guess: The podcasters were weighing the cost to themselves vs. the benefit to the podcaster. If the podcaster was poor and the listener was rich, the cost/benefit tradeoff favors paying. The listener feels happy to be supportive. If the situation were reversed, the math swings the other way. A principled listener might pay, but wouldn't necessarily feel happy about it.
msluyter 3y ago
Not sure if this is a complete explanation, but people tend to ascribe more value to physical objects and perhaps, because the general price of books is bounded within a known range that is fairly stable, don’t question the price as hard as they might. That is, if a book is roughly the same price of other books in the category you’ll tend to view the price as “fair.” The value of a podcast seems more nebulous to me, and perhaps this raises more questions. Unless you already subscribe to a lot of podcasts you may not have the equivalent comparison point, so more questions arise. On top of that, subscriptions create another barrier to entry and raise even more questions.

swozey 3y ago

What even is that? Just straight up entitlement? Ignorance to the situation? Just not caring? He has a great point, I can't think of any times I've ever asked those questions unless I thought the book author was grifting, where I'd go "Oh they're dog whistling to their flock for sales." I never thought "I hope mac miller doesn't use this $20 for drugs" buying mac miller albums..

jeegsy 3y ago
That's the question isn't it? If its entitlement as you say, why feel it with a podcast and not books?

CoastalCoder 3y ago

I might understand the moral reasoning here. Here's my guess: The podcasters were weighing the cost to themselves vs. the benefit to the podcaster. If the podcaster was poor and the listener was rich, the cost/benefit tradeoff favors paying. The listener feels happy to be supportive. If the situation were reversed, the math swings the other way. A principled listener might pay, but wouldn't necessarily feel happy about it.

msluyter 3y ago

Not sure if this is a complete explanation, but people tend to ascribe more value to physical objects and perhaps, because the general price of books is bounded within a known range that is fairly stable, don’t question the price as hard as they might. That is, if a book is roughly the same price of other books in the category you’ll tend to view the price as “fair.” The value of a podcast seems more nebulous to me, and perhaps this raises more questions. Unless you already subscribe to a lot of podcasts you may not have the equivalent comparison point, so more questions arise. On top of that, subscriptions create another barrier to entry and raise even more questions.