Solution to a problem that'll probably evaporate in a few years: website like Patreon, but for published authors/producers.
Visitors pledge a monthly amount (with ability to limit to N months) to any published creator.
Website repeatedly purchases a published item from that producer whenever sufficient funds accumulate, and provides public proof of the purchase to maintain trust.
If physical media was purchased, website operator donates it to a library/charity of their choice.
I learned in industry that there are problems that we can solve and sell those solutions to people who desperately need them, but not for enough money (or not cheaply enough) to justify us actually doing it.
Not just little websites but this often comes up at Real Work too.
I usually numb the pain this causes by moving on to the next problem for which we can actually charge enough to make it worth our while.
Maybe this is why fields need passionate devotees who work for (next to) nothing.
@CobaltVelvet I agree but on the flip side, all the Flat Earth and Scientology and evangelical people will also be able to devote themselves to their unsavory activities without worrying about income, and that worries me. Do you think the benefits will outweigh the drawbacks? Or is there a UBI proposal that seeks to address this in any way (seems like there couldn’t be but who knows, I ask because I’m ignorant).
@22 most of humanity is already devoted to establishing overcomplicated schemes to scam eachother through capitalism, i'm not sure it would get worse. maybe some of those people who have to rely to religion to feel better about their stressful or underpaid lives would be relieved, maybe all that free time combined with better and available to all education would protect people from fanatism
@CobaltVelvet Your comment reminded me of this Finn explaining Nordic capitalism + "smart, universal social policies that are in everyone’s self-interest" to Americans as a necessity of competing in the global age:
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/03/bernie-sanders-nordic-countries/473385/
I feel like this well-executed universal healthcare, education, and daycare would do a lot that UBI aims to do, with less uncertainty than UBI (because of Nordic existence proof). "Well-executed" is of course a huge challenge.
@22 yeah i think an UBI is mostly a method of achieving this while coming from capitalism, but individual policies are good as well and arguably more important
@CobaltVelvet Ohh, I see, that's a good way to see UBI also. I realize that usually I thought of UBI's main breakthrough being what comes after that stage, i.e., what people would do if they didn't have to work eight, ten hours a day to earn enough to pay rent+bills(+health insurance+daycare). That's like, scifi.
@CobaltVelvet I thought of another reason why UBI wouldn't necessarily make exactly this problem go away—ok it might pay for labor, but if your solution needs hardware that is expensive compared to what you can sell the solution for, then the solution still won't get made and the problem remains unsolved. Can't seem to get around the iron law of credits minus expenses…
@22 that's a good point and gets especially obvious with healthcare, which even with a UBI usually needs to be universal in its own way to be fair
That or, fields need devotees who are alert to prices falling unexpectedly and rush to make, passing on the savings to everyone else.
Such a website e.g., thanks to Stripe and AWS and open ledgers like Dat, could probably run with close to zero recurring overhead, and could net a lot of money for producers and the public for the upfront non-recurring expense (NRE) of just a couple of weeks of full-time coding.
I’d like to pitch this idea to a library and see what interest there is.
@22 i'd even say, maybe that's why we need an universal basic income and to stop quantifying people's value based on subjective work done or money earned