Scoble sees the light
Scoble has finally figured out that user generated content is another way of saying (digital) slave generated content.
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Scoble has finally figured out that user generated content is another way of saying (digital) slave generated content.
Related research and analysis from GigaOM Pro:
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Get serious.
I am doing this willingly. I am not being forced to write this comment. I am not a slave.
I am such a willing participant in your success that I even allow you to run that EarthLink ad on my computer in my browser and I’ll click through it just for you.
Slave. Feh.
And this is nothing new.
jake, you are a kind patron. you are offering time and attention and reading my stuff.and for that i am grateful. i am not asking you to do my work, just consume it. someone (earthlink etc) is willing to pay for my work for you to consume. that’s different from the whole ridiculous notion of “user generated content” if you create the content, for me, and i get to take home the money….
It’s intertwined.
You create useful which I consume. Based on that consumption, Earthlink, Google, GoToMyPC, etc pay you.
Your site is more valuable to me because you allow me (and the rest of you audience) to create content/comments on this site and enrich your content. I believe we (speaking, perhaps misguided, for your audience) do this freely with no expectation of renumeration.
I enjoy Andy’s site as well, but he does not have comments. It’s less valuable to me as a willing participant.
I pay to be a member of Flickr and if they end up making money off of my thousands of snapshots, so be it. I believe they provide a valuable service at a bargain as it is.
If you look at the Yahoo groups or message boards – tens of millions of messages all created by users – many of whom had to click by interstitial ads at some point for the privilege of doing so.
If advertising and aggregation is the price we give up to the theater owner to be on stage, so be it. We want to act!
jake, you are basically agreeing with me… nice! i love it, though you are approaching it from your point of view. what i have been saying is that unless there is a full give and take, i.e. i satisfy something for you, and you get something valuable out of it (and vice versa) that is what I think is the real “user generated” content. I don’t presume your generosity… i want to give before I ask… that is the critical difference I have been trying to make.
If your content were hosted on a free TypePad service and, as terms of that service, Six Apart displayed and received the revenue from AdSense ads, I’d still post comments.
The value is purely in the content and the exchange from a consumer perspective (well this limited consumer’s perspective). Now, I’d think you were crazy, perhaps, for giving away the revenue, but if you were an oracle of things telecom and bootstrapping your weblog presence, I could understand it.
In that case, Six Apart would be the “leech” but in fact you’ve agreed to their terms. So, you’re square with them (they host, you provide content, they take the revenues) and I’m square with you (you provide content, I read it and perhaps post comments).
Seems like all business models in that case are fair.