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Hacker News Hacker NewsIn other words, it loses all (human) meaning.
So yes, if you care at all, you shouldn’t “create content”. You should be writing essays, recording tutorials, training, music, conversations, etc. the kind of things you care about, for an audience whose attention you don’t take for granted, hoping that they too will care at least a little. If they do, they will pay you because they will rather part with money than part with your work.
> using the word as a noun to describe works and communications through which people have expressed themselves adopts an attitude you might rather avoid: it treats them as a commodity whose purpose is to fill a box and make money. In effect, it disparages all the works by subordinating them to the box that is full.
The alternative is "art" but that comes with a lot of other baggage that often sounds unintentionally pretentious, especially if you aren't actually creating paintings/sculptures/traditional/contemporary studio art. The word creative used to serve a similar purpose, but nowadays I think it sounds both blasé and pretentious.
Yes, content does come with an expectation that you're creating things for an commercial audience; however, I think content is tied to media, and not merely any sort of created object. And so by extension you are participating in the global media sphere by making content, and not just painting for your own enjoyment.
It’s also worth pointing out that while Michelangelo did think of himself as an artist and a sculptor and painter, those professions were basically tradesmen at the time. The concept of high art, in the purely non-economic way we think of today, didn’t come for centuries after his life.
I was hired at a job the very same day Google released their first Panda update[0]. This was the update that nuked all content farmers from search results. It was complete chaos, I sat in an empty cubicle, not knowing if I should stay or leave while the manager cursed and paced. Our ad revenue went from millions to zero, overnight. Unfortunately, they figured out a trick to game google. Which I guess meant I remained employed.
You could make the tackiest, most commercial and derivative musical, but it's still not content because it's just one.
You could make the most eloquent, poetic and inventive podcast in the world, but so long as you are still doing weekly releases (with ads, plus an ad free patreon, of course) it is content.
The tragedy is that we want artists to have reliable income, but the business models, incentives and consumption habits that come with the reliable output to provide that reliable income lead us to the ugliness that people blame on "content".
I have to agree. It is dehumanizing. But, it's unfortunate, because the language of business is the language of business. We have this one. We don't have a separate, identically shaped one, made up of nicer sounding words.
Would be nice if we did, though.
Did I feel that way because I did not expect the statute to be so large ? The strength displayed to be so soft ? Was there something in the air ?
The only other instance I had of such a feeling was at the Lake Louise, in Alberta (Canada). In both moments, I could remember the thought of seeing something that could not be in any point better than it is.
I don't think a content creator would naturally describe themselves as a content creator. The word is useful for contexts where you need to generalize over all the different types, but that's not useful when speaking about yourself. So a writer says "I'm a writer", not "I'm a content creator." But writing this paragraph, I needed a word to generalize.
P.S. The closest alternative word might be artist, but it's not quite right--some writers are artists and some aren't.
"Content" implies there is something else, besides content, that is found on the www
It's garbage, not The New Yorker, for example
When data collection, surveilllance and advertising is the sole "business model" then traffic is the business goal, not "content" (The New Yorker does not rely 100% on advertising, it also has subscription revenue)
"Content is king" but it is not an absolute requirement for traffic
That's why "Big Tech" companies are intermediaries (middlemen), they do not need to create "content"
Website operators without content have been buying traffic since the early years of the www
The www is infested with middlemen with no content
They profit from traffic
Content makes good bait for traffic but Big Tech cannot charge subscriptions for it because it isn't theirs; they have to pay for a license
I understand the history behind where that term came from. (The people who were making musical decisions while standing behind the mixing board often were initially producers: people whose job it was to oversee the entire production and coordinate between the musicians, engineers, etc. Then when DJs at discotheques wanted longer versions of songs for dancefloors, remixes were invented. Producers took existing recordings and made longer versions. Then electronic dance music sort of evolved out of that.)
But it still feels like such a soulless term. And most "producers" today are just sitting at home alone with a laptop and Ableton, so the role is very different than it was.
On one side, I think that those who manage to generate a trusted audience can benefit from this as LLMs generate generic content.
On the other side, people could get so used to generic content — like Tik-Toks — that it will only be a handful of people coming to those generating thoughtful content.
It's a good man who can bring home the sculpture that his wife likes at the end of his workday.
But why does it have to be him, and his wife, and a sculpture.
Surely the merit is in the person who brings the content that their partner likes, no matter where or when, or what.
It's a bit depressing watching language get shallow …
> I've never created content, I've written things down. > I've never created content, I've said things out loud. > I've never created content, I've recorded a video. > I've never created content, I've shown someone around. > I've never created content, I've pointed something out.
In other scenarios the non "corp-speak" term feels kind of wrong and the "corp-speak" one is actually better though. I feel like this is all just a realization about what the goal of the business actually is and a realization of just how many different goals you could have. In this case it sounds like it's just to do some good writing, not to grow for the sake of making more money or whatever else. And that makes a huge difference in how you talk about it of course.
Also if someone used the word "lead" I'd conclude that they... work in sales? How can that mean anything about whether they'll be helpful to you or not?
Ok one more thought: sometimes the corp-speak feels way less stuck up than "oh actually, I'm a writer. I measure progress not from other people being willing to pay me some money, but in terms of my own highly refined taste. I have many leather-bound books, and..."
It's called "Stewart Lee: Content Provider" and its hilarous.
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I could not resist playing this game of words...
I wish somebody could motivate me to publish them anyway.
You could make a plausible conspiracy theory that this was why so much capital was invested to develop generative AI: Maybe the holy grail of tech CEOs wasn't AGI, it was a web full of content without those annoying content creators...
And this isn't to say that "content creation" is any less valid than "creating art". There are plenty of "content creators" who know exactly what they are making at the end of the day (a product) and don't hide that fact or try to dress it up under the pretense of being anything more.
There's slop, and there's masterpiece. In which would you rather invest your time? (Either creating or 'consuming'?)
Ie. If you see yourself as a 'content creator' then the best you're going to be is a slop merchant. If you see yourself as an author or a writer then you at least have a chance at being a real artist, like Michaelangelo.
It uses lots of words to make it's point which, for me, smacks of 'content' (I was expecting there to be a recipe at the end). They haven't stopped 'creating content' but they're attempting to stop calling it that.
That's what I got out of it anyway. But then again I may just be salty that I'm not also a Don Draper (slop merchant).
The first section did a great job of grabbing my attention. It feels like these days, all creative works are lumped together as "content", anything not brand-new and bleeding-edge is labelled "legacy" (I see this more on HN than anywhere), and everything is distilled down to "engagement" and "conversions".
I hate business buzzword-jargon, the corporate in-group lingo, and I've also always disliked this use of the word "content". It's too generic - we might as well be calling it "stuff".
As a child, I used to notice that there were some other kids who, upon hearing a word that was new to them, would immediately start using it incessantly, replacing the (sometimes richer) choice of words they'd thus far been brought up to use. Very often wrongly, by slightly misunderstanding the meaning, the context, or the word itself, and never checking first. It was clear how the choice of words used, or even the meaning of words, could subtly change within a small group. As I grew older I realised these people appeared to be in the majority, and that it showed how, via various methods of trying to sound clever or in-group signalling, changes in speech patterns spread out across the larger population.
Anyway that's my view, now I'll go back to yelling at clouds.
The stronger you feel about it and the more you seem to enjoy sharing your opinions on it, the less interesting you become.
I stopped reading at this sentence and couldn't take the rest of the article seriously. It felt .... pretentious and self centered.
"They content create, I despise that; I create content, then they tries that.."
That’s not what it means. It means that the vendor and you are a good fit for each other. The hard part in almost all these things is that two parties would both benefit if they had common knowledge but they don’t have common knowledge. The guy who puts the two together is useful. That’s who you describe as “sending great leads”.
It’s not clear to me why this style of manufactured grievance writing is popular. The world is full of Pareto wins.