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> content creation I seriously hate the term "content" used for "creative output". It is a terrible, derogatory word, that makes me sad. Content is only there

> content creation I seriously hate the term "content" used for "creative output". It is a terrible, derogatory word, that makes me sad. Content is only there to have something to sell, to fill the blank space around ads, the actual content of the content doesn't matter. That people refer to themselves as "content creators" is a sign that they see the value of their creative output only to make money.

doctorwho42 2y ago
Welcome to the hyper capitalist world that has been created over the past 60 years. This is the result of always needed growth in your economic system.
- anthonypasq 2y ago
  this seems like a complete non-sequitur to me
  - giardini 2y ago
    But now you've added a sequitur! (It's OK to leave a thread dangling in the wind.)
  - alexyz12 2y ago
    seems very relevant to me. Isn't it capitalism that reduces our value to $s? And thus our art is only valuable as content?
    - shafoshaf 2y ago
      I think this is a common misconception of the comparison between "capitalism" and other forms of economic distribution. It's not capitalism that equates everything to dollars, it is how the universe works. This was the beauty of Karl Marx's thinking. He postulated that the best way to measure value is in the amount of human labor that goes into the output. However, once you have a medium to equate the value of a new chair into labor then I can come up with an another transformation to equate that labor into some defined quantity of glass beads. It turns out that choosing Labor as the "value" is completely arbitrary, and so dollars (or yen or gold) works just as well as a medium for conversion.
      - MassPikeMike 2y ago
        Choosing labor as the value is worse than arbitrary, because labor is far less fungible than (say) commodities. The value of labor depends on whose labor it is for the job. Half an hour's labor by one person can turn apples, flour, butter, and sugar into a delicious pie; half an hour's labor by a different person will create a soggy mess. In one case, labor adds value; in another case, it destroys value (can't use that flour for anything else now.)
      - funcDropShadow 2y ago
        > This was the beauty of Karl Marx's thinking. He postulated that the best way to measure value is in the amount of human labor that goes into the output. This is indeed the most beautiful insight of Karl Marx that I ever read. This predicts perfectly why all socialist/communist economies collapse. They value inefficiency. The more work is needed to build a product, the more valuable it is --- according to Marx. That is one of the most fundamental error in his theories.
        rakoo 2y ago
        You're assuming socialist/communist economies must, for some reason, be run exactly the same as capitalist economies. Of course if you're trying to mix both it will collapse. The point of Marx isn't that we should create markets where the value is decided by the amount of labor. The point of Marx is that if Labor creates value, then Labor should be in charge. The problem being that Labor is hard, so the end goal cannot be to maximize Labor (or value), contrary to your implied way of thinking were the most value must be created.
        funcDropShadow 2y ago
        If maximizing value is not the goal, then why should Marxism redefine value in a counter-intuitive way? Btw, "Labor" cannot be in charge, outside the UK at least, because Labor is an abstract concept. In Marxist societies people are in charge that pretend to have the laborers best interest in their hearts. But as they "Some are more equal than others."
- daedrdev 2y ago
  Somehow the increased accessibility of being an independent entertainer instead of having to work in a toxic entertainment industry that regularly covered up widespread abuse means that capitalism bad.
- cloverich 2y ago
  Can you elaborate on your selection of 60 for the inception point?
  - 8bitsrule 2y ago
    That's about the time teen magazines emerged, isn't it. And the subsequent explosion of trends and rumors mags.
- golergka 2y ago
  Economic growth is another way of saying "improving people's lives". An economic system which always needs to improve people's lives is a good thing, actually. When you compare modern first world to 60 years ago, people's lives have significantly improved. And if you do the same in developed countries, the difference is unbelievable.
  - mellavora 2y ago
    The promise of capitalism is to improve people's circumstances and thus make them happy. The promise of buddhism is to make people happy regardless of circumstances.
    - golergka 2y ago
      And the promise of communism is to make everyone equally miserable. I was born in USSR and still remember 5-hour queues for rotting cabbage, thanks.
      - red1reaper 2y ago
        The promise of communism is that the worker owns the means of production, the worker, not the goverment. If the goverment owns your means of production, it's just a corpo disguissed as a country.
  - _DeadFred_ 2y ago
    Problem is the 10-20 year window doesn't look so good. Only vampires don't realize you can't suck every last drop out out. Every good manager knows you can't count on more than 80% employee utilization in the best circumstances with the best people. Now companies expect zero hour employees (part time employees who are guaranteed zero hours/zero schedule but expected to move their lives around their job, which is one of three part time jobs they need to survive) to do more than that by requiring employees do the manager's job of finding shift coverage off hours using their personal phone, etc while also being 100% utilized during work hours, with zero overlapping roll coverage. That isn't sustainable and no way live, and is an unreasonable expectation from a zero hour job.
jl6 2y ago
Nobody ever thought to themselves: I sure could go for some content right now.
- wisemang 2y ago
  Heh, my brother-in-law have described “content” as being the “love language” of our boomer dads.. the sharing of material (surprisingly often on TikTok these days) that none of us really care about yet continually gets sent out to us. Seemingly the favoured way to keep in touch.
  - _DeadFred_ 2y ago
    Not a boomer but honestly every year that passes I can tell my cognitive decline by how much harder it is to not send these things to my kids. I have a folder full of them marked 'inheritance' so that I can be assured my kids will find it when they scour my computer after I'm dead. They are going to be so stoked!
    - Dansvidania 2y ago
      As someone that is on the receiving end of such a content feed, I thank you for your attempt not to send things.
    - codetrotter 2y ago
      Have you considered opening a high interest account for the inheritance? Inflation is a sad fact of life. A funny picture that would get a heartfelt laugh out of most anyone this year, could be eliciting as little as a sensible chuckle 30 years from now! That’s why it’s important to not just shove all your memes onto some USB drive and sticking it in the mattress. Think wisely, let the Meme Bank be the custodian of all your funny pictures and videos. Just by looking at a period of 10 years back compared to now, we can see a stark difference between the meme collections that families kept at home vs the meme collections of families that kept their memes in Meme Bank. There are two factors that contribute by an outsized amount to the lowering of value of the meme collections of average Joe over the years: Firstly, resolution and compression artifacts. Where ten years ago a 640 by 480 pixels jpeg would have garnered applause from the people you showed it to, the people of today expect more. And all you’d be getting today for that once glorious meme, would be responses asking you “y’all got any more of them pixels?” Secondly, stale pop-cultural reference. That meme you’ve got referencing a scene from a movie from last year. Yeah, it might still be funny today. In thirty years, usually not so much. Here at Meme Bank, we take care of these things and that’s how we’re able to keep your meme collection as funny as ever. “But…”, I hear you say, “these memes hold sentimental value to me, and they are reflective of my kind of humor and of my personality.” Believe you me when I say, we know that and we respect that. That is why our Meme Experts here at Meme Bank work tightly with our customers to ensure that your meme collections remain true to your individuality. So don’t hesitate, call us today at 555-MEME. That’s 555-MEME.
ALittleLight 2y ago
This seems unnecessarily negative and pessimistic. "Content" is the stuff or substance that people want to consume as opposed to all the associated stuff (branding, SEO, "hooks", whatever). "Content creator" recognizes that there is similarity between long form video essays and shorts and blogs and live streams - and that people who do one often do others.
- DowagerDave 2y ago
  I don't agree. The emphasis on content implies it's the output that is most important, and that you can split it out from all the nonsense you differentiate above. Many of the people in this thread counter that the act of creation is the most important part. Just stop with "Creator" (or builder or writer).
alwayslikethis 2y ago
Related: https://pauljun.me/the-four-dirty-c-words-of-the-internet https://pauljun.me/the-four-dirty-c-words-of-the-internet
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
HappMacDonald 2y ago
The challenge is that every fruit must have its seed. (Even seedless varieties are artificially created by labs which then themselves can be viewed as the seeds, but I digress..) Nothing of value to others is truly created in a vacuum. It must have some system of re-uptake, of value being conferred back to the creator or else it will never repeat. Ads are one potential way that can be accomplished, but as much as we hate ads we can't just expect them to go away and leave the "content" alone. We have to replace them with some other superior way of remunerating the creators. I wish flattr would have took off as a service, that sort of low-friction idea seemed quite promising.
kiba 2y ago
I don't use the word "content" that way. What you call "content" I call internet slops.
jeremyjh 2y ago
Content is absolutely the best word for most of the shit they are shoveling. I would never use this term to describe a musician or author though I admit it isn't possible to objectively prove the difference and I wouldn't be surprised if younger people can't tell at all.
hengheng 2y ago
Content describes a place in media in a formal way, by saying where it goes and what its role is. This way to categorize "content" makes it a form. It's similar to how Content Management Systems used to manage the layout and navigation of a website, but never managed the content. They accessed the content that came out of the database, but surely there had to be an author to manage the content. The CMS did everything but.
maxvt 2y ago
We got a great new word for it now: "slop" (as in, "AI-generated slop"). It can be human generated as well, and the key point is exactly as you wrote it -- it only exists to sell ads around it and has minimal or even negative (wrong or outdated information, poor reasoning, etc.) nutritional value.
- 8bitsrule 2y ago
  So, it's a lot like newstand (or grocery aisle) popular magazines did back then, back in the Elvis days.
guy234 2y ago
Perhaps an indication of its superficiality is the awkwardness of describing something as "content about" a topic. Its more like a binary, on/off, in that way similar to a lightbulb.
insane_dreamer 2y ago
> That people refer to themselves as "content creators" is a sign that they see the value of their creative output only to make money and it is that way. the worse thing is that you have a younger generation thinking that it's the future of work or something. "Why do I need to do well in school when I'm going to make cute TikTok videos and people are going to pay me lots of money" (almost verbatim words from a 12 year old boy)
hbarka 2y ago
What term would you prefer?
rambambram 2y ago
This museum definitely has some nice content, even better than the content at the library! I think the use of the word 'content' stems from the times when all this technological innovation had more emphasis on programming and design and people were busy to find ideas/applications for all the newfound possibilities. Content was an afterthought. I remember being busy with building a website - around 1998 or so - and only afterwards asking myself what I should use it for. I already got my high from finishing the programming/coding, now I had to fill it up with content. Some years later, throw some marketeers and MBA type people in the mix, mix it with SEO and ads, and a legitimate need for 'content' arises. Doesn't matter what content, just content. Google is going to decide whether it's good content ('good' of course meaning 'monetizable').

doctorwho42 2y ago

Welcome to the hyper capitalist world that has been created over the past 60 years. This is the result of always needed growth in your economic system.

anthonypasq 2y ago
this seems like a complete non-sequitur to me
- giardini 2y ago
  But now you've added a sequitur! (It's OK to leave a thread dangling in the wind.)
- alexyz12 2y ago
  seems very relevant to me. Isn't it capitalism that reduces our value to $s? And thus our art is only valuable as content?
  - shafoshaf 2y ago
    I think this is a common misconception of the comparison between "capitalism" and other forms of economic distribution. It's not capitalism that equates everything to dollars, it is how the universe works. This was the beauty of Karl Marx's thinking. He postulated that the best way to measure value is in the amount of human labor that goes into the output. However, once you have a medium to equate the value of a new chair into labor then I can come up with an another transformation to equate that labor into some defined quantity of glass beads. It turns out that choosing Labor as the "value" is completely arbitrary, and so dollars (or yen or gold) works just as well as a medium for conversion.
    - MassPikeMike 2y ago
      Choosing labor as the value is worse than arbitrary, because labor is far less fungible than (say) commodities. The value of labor depends on whose labor it is for the job. Half an hour's labor by one person can turn apples, flour, butter, and sugar into a delicious pie; half an hour's labor by a different person will create a soggy mess. In one case, labor adds value; in another case, it destroys value (can't use that flour for anything else now.)
    - funcDropShadow 2y ago
      > This was the beauty of Karl Marx's thinking. He postulated that the best way to measure value is in the amount of human labor that goes into the output. This is indeed the most beautiful insight of Karl Marx that I ever read. This predicts perfectly why all socialist/communist economies collapse. They value inefficiency. The more work is needed to build a product, the more valuable it is --- according to Marx. That is one of the most fundamental error in his theories.
      - rakoo 2y ago
        You're assuming socialist/communist economies must, for some reason, be run exactly the same as capitalist economies. Of course if you're trying to mix both it will collapse. The point of Marx isn't that we should create markets where the value is decided by the amount of labor. The point of Marx is that if Labor creates value, then Labor should be in charge. The problem being that Labor is hard, so the end goal cannot be to maximize Labor (or value), contrary to your implied way of thinking were the most value must be created.
        funcDropShadow 2y ago
        If maximizing value is not the goal, then why should Marxism redefine value in a counter-intuitive way? Btw, "Labor" cannot be in charge, outside the UK at least, because Labor is an abstract concept. In Marxist societies people are in charge that pretend to have the laborers best interest in their hearts. But as they "Some are more equal than others."
daedrdev 2y ago
Somehow the increased accessibility of being an independent entertainer instead of having to work in a toxic entertainment industry that regularly covered up widespread abuse means that capitalism bad.
cloverich 2y ago
Can you elaborate on your selection of 60 for the inception point?
- 8bitsrule 2y ago
  That's about the time teen magazines emerged, isn't it. And the subsequent explosion of trends and rumors mags.
golergka 2y ago
Economic growth is another way of saying "improving people's lives". An economic system which always needs to improve people's lives is a good thing, actually. When you compare modern first world to 60 years ago, people's lives have significantly improved. And if you do the same in developed countries, the difference is unbelievable.
- mellavora 2y ago
  The promise of capitalism is to improve people's circumstances and thus make them happy. The promise of buddhism is to make people happy regardless of circumstances.
  - golergka 2y ago
    And the promise of communism is to make everyone equally miserable. I was born in USSR and still remember 5-hour queues for rotting cabbage, thanks.
    - red1reaper 2y ago
      The promise of communism is that the worker owns the means of production, the worker, not the goverment. If the goverment owns your means of production, it's just a corpo disguissed as a country.
- _DeadFred_ 2y ago
  Problem is the 10-20 year window doesn't look so good. Only vampires don't realize you can't suck every last drop out out. Every good manager knows you can't count on more than 80% employee utilization in the best circumstances with the best people. Now companies expect zero hour employees (part time employees who are guaranteed zero hours/zero schedule but expected to move their lives around their job, which is one of three part time jobs they need to survive) to do more than that by requiring employees do the manager's job of finding shift coverage off hours using their personal phone, etc while also being 100% utilized during work hours, with zero overlapping roll coverage. That isn't sustainable and no way live, and is an unreasonable expectation from a zero hour job.

jl6 2y ago

Nobody ever thought to themselves: I sure could go for some content right now.

wisemang 2y ago
Heh, my brother-in-law have described “content” as being the “love language” of our boomer dads.. the sharing of material (surprisingly often on TikTok these days) that none of us really care about yet continually gets sent out to us. Seemingly the favoured way to keep in touch.
- _DeadFred_ 2y ago
  Not a boomer but honestly every year that passes I can tell my cognitive decline by how much harder it is to not send these things to my kids. I have a folder full of them marked 'inheritance' so that I can be assured my kids will find it when they scour my computer after I'm dead. They are going to be so stoked!
  - Dansvidania 2y ago
    As someone that is on the receiving end of such a content feed, I thank you for your attempt not to send things.
  - codetrotter 2y ago
    Have you considered opening a high interest account for the inheritance? Inflation is a sad fact of life. A funny picture that would get a heartfelt laugh out of most anyone this year, could be eliciting as little as a sensible chuckle 30 years from now! That’s why it’s important to not just shove all your memes onto some USB drive and sticking it in the mattress. Think wisely, let the Meme Bank be the custodian of all your funny pictures and videos. Just by looking at a period of 10 years back compared to now, we can see a stark difference between the meme collections that families kept at home vs the meme collections of families that kept their memes in Meme Bank. There are two factors that contribute by an outsized amount to the lowering of value of the meme collections of average Joe over the years: Firstly, resolution and compression artifacts. Where ten years ago a 640 by 480 pixels jpeg would have garnered applause from the people you showed it to, the people of today expect more. And all you’d be getting today for that once glorious meme, would be responses asking you “y’all got any more of them pixels?” Secondly, stale pop-cultural reference. That meme you’ve got referencing a scene from a movie from last year. Yeah, it might still be funny today. In thirty years, usually not so much. Here at Meme Bank, we take care of these things and that’s how we’re able to keep your meme collection as funny as ever. “But…”, I hear you say, “these memes hold sentimental value to me, and they are reflective of my kind of humor and of my personality.” Believe you me when I say, we know that and we respect that. That is why our Meme Experts here at Meme Bank work tightly with our customers to ensure that your meme collections remain true to your individuality. So don’t hesitate, call us today at 555-MEME. That’s 555-MEME.

ALittleLight 2y ago

This seems unnecessarily negative and pessimistic. "Content" is the stuff or substance that people want to consume as opposed to all the associated stuff (branding, SEO, "hooks", whatever). "Content creator" recognizes that there is similarity between long form video essays and shorts and blogs and live streams - and that people who do one often do others.

DowagerDave 2y ago
I don't agree. The emphasis on content implies it's the output that is most important, and that you can split it out from all the nonsense you differentiate above. Many of the people in this thread counter that the act of creation is the most important part. Just stop with "Creator" (or builder or writer).

alwayslikethis 2y ago

Related: https://pauljun.me/the-four-dirty-c-words-of-the-internet https://pauljun.me/the-four-dirty-c-words-of-the-internet

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

HappMacDonald 2y ago

The challenge is that every fruit must have its seed. (Even seedless varieties are artificially created by labs which then themselves can be viewed as the seeds, but I digress..) Nothing of value to others is truly created in a vacuum. It must have some system of re-uptake, of value being conferred back to the creator or else it will never repeat. Ads are one potential way that can be accomplished, but as much as we hate ads we can't just expect them to go away and leave the "content" alone. We have to replace them with some other superior way of remunerating the creators. I wish flattr would have took off as a service, that sort of low-friction idea seemed quite promising.

kiba 2y ago

I don't use the word "content" that way. What you call "content" I call internet slops.

jeremyjh 2y ago

Content is absolutely the best word for most of the shit they are shoveling. I would never use this term to describe a musician or author though I admit it isn't possible to objectively prove the difference and I wouldn't be surprised if younger people can't tell at all.

hengheng 2y ago

Content describes a place in media in a formal way, by saying where it goes and what its role is. This way to categorize "content" makes it a form. It's similar to how Content Management Systems used to manage the layout and navigation of a website, but never managed the content. They accessed the content that came out of the database, but surely there had to be an author to manage the content. The CMS did everything but.

maxvt 2y ago

We got a great new word for it now: "slop" (as in, "AI-generated slop"). It can be human generated as well, and the key point is exactly as you wrote it -- it only exists to sell ads around it and has minimal or even negative (wrong or outdated information, poor reasoning, etc.) nutritional value.

8bitsrule 2y ago
So, it's a lot like newstand (or grocery aisle) popular magazines did back then, back in the Elvis days.

guy234 2y ago

Perhaps an indication of its superficiality is the awkwardness of describing something as "content about" a topic. Its more like a binary, on/off, in that way similar to a lightbulb.

insane_dreamer 2y ago

> That people refer to themselves as "content creators" is a sign that they see the value of their creative output only to make money and it is that way. the worse thing is that you have a younger generation thinking that it's the future of work or something. "Why do I need to do well in school when I'm going to make cute TikTok videos and people are going to pay me lots of money" (almost verbatim words from a 12 year old boy)

hbarka 2y ago

What term would you prefer?

rambambram 2y ago

This museum definitely has some nice content, even better than the content at the library! I think the use of the word 'content' stems from the times when all this technological innovation had more emphasis on programming and design and people were busy to find ideas/applications for all the newfound possibilities. Content was an afterthought. I remember being busy with building a website - around 1998 or so - and only afterwards asking myself what I should use it for. I already got my high from finishing the programming/coding, now I had to fill it up with content. Some years later, throw some marketeers and MBA type people in the mix, mix it with SEO and ads, and a legitimate need for 'content' arises. Doesn't matter what content, just content. Google is going to decide whether it's good content ('good' of course meaning 'monetizable').