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Comment by CuriouslyC | Hacker News Reader

People question how we'll support content without ads, but I have to take a step back and wonder - is content that needs to be supported really that valuable? Might the world be a better place without it?

People who are passionate about the subject they are writing on are going to publish regardless of ad revenue, assuming they get hits (writing stuff nobody reads is a fast track to burnout). Right now, in many cases these people are being crowded out by well SEO'd content mills. If the advertising dollars dry up, the content mills will die off, and that ecological niche will be freed up to be filled by people with passion.

I for one welcome the idea of a return to a genuine internet, where everything isn't about monetization. The amount of content may go down, but the quality will almost certainly go way up, and there will be that much less garbage to wade through.

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No, it will not be filled by people with "passion", it will be filled by people with free time and economic security. We don't yet live in a world where passion is enough to motivate free content.

Nobody is going to go through the trouble of writing content they aren't passionate about if there isn't a financial incentive.

As for the free time argument, people who are passionate about a subject make time for it. These people you claim are too busy just surviving to write content still find time for several hours of television/video games/other worthless use of time a day.

No, those two categories are basically the same. Middle class people with solid 9-5 jobs and not many other commitments. Some portion of these people create stuff in their free time.

The people I'm talking about are either too poor to follow their passions and work for free, or have the time but have decided to channel their passion into something that might make them money.

Basically, I have a problem with this quote: "Is content that needs to be supported really that valuable? Might the world be a better place without it?" The idea that anybody who publishes anything of value would be willing and able to do it for free is just obviously wrong. The world would not be a better place if independent content were only created by a tiny portion of humanity.

Just because you publish content for free doesn't mean that you don't derive value from it. By establishing yourself as an expert you can (just off the top of my head):

- create a market for yourself as a consultant/instructor/offer seminars in that area

- charge businesses to feature reviews of their goods and services

- sell books/prints/tshirts/(insert relevant merch for type of content here)

None of these avenues are viable for content mills. I stand by my original point that if content was free and everyone monetized their expertise this way we'd have a much better internet.

That's a great list of things that poor people, people with families, people with busy lives for any reason can't do. You need to first establish yourself as an expert, for free, with all of your free time.

Regardless, this is all possible right now. "if content was free"? Content can be free, there's lots of it. Removing every way for non-experts to make money would only hurt people, it wouldn't help anyone. It wouldn't make it any easier to publish stuff for free.

What's the benefit for society that poor people have the ability to marginally add to their income by writing words that they don't care if anybody reads?

Generally, the reason I say things to people is that I want them to hear what I'm saying, not because every time I can sneak in an endorsement of a product (that I haven't even selected), I get a nickel. I can want them to hear because I want to improve their lives, because I want to appeal to their consciences, because I'm an exhibitionist, because I want to coordinate activities with them, or even because I want them to give me money (not for a long time, and I'm sure my parents are happy about that.)

How did the last become the only one that is legitimate, and the only one that it considered a realistic source of motivation for providing the public with a range of things that they want to see or hear?

It's weird that the preservation of purposeless words is a concern of people. I would expect the people who think that we need a financial motivation to express themselves would largely conduct themselves through life silently.

And the greatest value is that you wanted people to hear what you had to say about something, and some did.

No. You are basically saying that people should work for free if they are passionate about it. Professional writers cannot pay their bills with passion. Same with artists, musicians etc, and every other underpaid profession. Just because they (hopefully) like what they do, does not mean it is not work or does not have value.

> Professional writers cannot pay their bills with passion

Professional writers aren’t ad-financed.

Look at Panama Papers.

Not a single of the involved newspapers and broadcasters is ad financed: All are either tax or subscription financed.

Btw, for just 19.99€ you can get full access to all articles about Panama Papers in the Süddeutsche if you don’t want to enter a 12-month subscription for the whole newspaper.

>Professional writers aren’t ad-financed.

Wrong.

While some outlets enjoy full state support or sufficient subscription revenue to not need advertisements, the VAST majority of publications get a significant portion of their revenue (which is the used to pay their staff writers and freelance contributors) from ads. Better known examples of such publications include: The New York Times, Wired, The Atlantic.

In Norway, where I live, Aftenposten was given access to the Panama Papers for analysis and publication. Aftenposten is partially subsidized by the Norwegian government, but also dependent on ad revenue to survive.

An artist/writer/musician isn't entitled to make a living at their passion. The ones that do make a living with their work are the ones that produce things that many people find valuable; society has deemed their work good enough that it wants to support them doing it full time.

Of course, there are rare cases of great artists/etc who can't make a living because they haven't been "discovered" yet, or because their work runs against the current trends (despite being brilliant). I would argue these are the minority, and for the most part the system is functioning properly.

> Just because they (hopefully) like what they do, does not mean it is not work or does not have value.

Nothing has value. Value is assigned to something by people who are willing to pay. I wouldn't say that people should work for free; I would say that people shouldn't do something if they don't want to.

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