The results of this analysis UP FRONT:
in 2024, WE, the CONTENT PRODUCERS of the WORLD,
are being SCAMMED!
In the olden days of publishing, and for over 500 years, producers of content were compensated by publishers of content, often up front and on some agreement of remuneration. For example, if I were to produce a short film for a client, I would calculate my price per minute of finished video, add profit, and bill accordingly.
Likewise, for any writing, I would produce up until about 2021 or so. An editor and I would agree on price often by piece or by word count, and work would be submitted and content published.
Now, here online and publishing to the world, the game has changed. We are paid by clicks, likes, watch times, views, and a black box algorithm that no content provider understands.
Example 1. Payment metrics have changed, for the worse…
In the case of video, my payment over the years has gone from 1000 USD per minute of the finished video to about 10 USD per quarter for one minute of online video, on a good day.
Example 2. Poverty permeates payment plans…
In the case of what was previously called “writing” then “blogging” and now “stacking” we have this payout plan:
Lots of statistics, metric comparisons, and pretty charts & graphs never had before, but very little money to show for all this fancy display.
Example 3. Everyone is doing it - scamming you!
Medium.com, like Substack, uses algorithms to determine compensation for the writer, and in this case, about $7.00, but with a very pretty graph:
Most platforms out there operate algorithmically about the same, so in short, there is no escape from the scam.
Summary
The three examples above represent about 50 videos with a total time of about 1¼ hours of video, and about 50,000 words of written, illustrated text. In the real world, these examples would represent one Video Documentary and one written Book.
In the real world, these examples would represent one Video Documentary and one written Book. Yet there is no comparison in compensation…
After 3 months of that “work" being online, my compensation all told across many publishing platforms (my content is replicated on Pinterest, Instagram, TikTok, Substack, and Medium) was USD 27. To that, I say WTF!
And why do I say that with a pained face? When one looks at what I would have been paid in 2003 for the same work, one sees the current disparity and dystopia of today’s publishing industry:
That chart1 explains the current situation, and the situation over time for content producers’ compensation when using today’s techBro publishing platforms. A 99 percent drop in income over 30 years to compensate for two simple works. Of course, these are my numbers, but I suspect there are millions of others in the same boat on these platforms, based on the latest producer numbers available from these platforms (not that they are at all transparent about this).
In short, publishing today has become another casino scam created by techBros to milk us all dry.
Calculation algorithm:
# Initial and final earning pointsinitial_earnings = 13000 # Earnings in 2003final_earnings = 27 # Earnings in 2023 # Calculating the percent declinepercent_decline = ((initial_earnings - final_earnings) / initial_earnings) * 100 percent_decline
Result = 99.79230769230769
Spot on. The rise of social media, and outsourcing / gig work has decimated the value of the written word.
Between jobs, I had 6 months (forced) sabbatical and I signed up for a couple of those piecework sites and I "bid" on some basic product management/marketing work. The customers want a lot, and when you quote something rational, they go with a very low price for someone from eastern Europe.
One was a small start-up that was looking for marketing support for a simple product launch. I estimated that it was probably 70 - 80 hours of work. GTM plan, promotional materials, data sheet, simple web page, a PR schedule and posts. I bid that at $6,500, a reasonable amount for a one-time project, but they would then have a blueprint to do it themselves in the future.
The winning bid was from Croatia and it was about $575 total.
Alas, I now know why 95% of start-ups fail.