I’ve gotten some amazing feedback from the stop crying over your worthless content post, and I really appreciate it, here’s why.  I have two strengths and one main weakness as a writer / thinker.  I am very talented when it comes to producing a well thought out piece of literature when I meticulously put together my thoughts in a structured manner and edit until I am satisfied with what I’ve produced.  This type of writing is laborious and takes a lot of time, but in the end the content produced is well structured, thought out, and communicated.  Writing a college term paper or article for a magazine are good examples.  My second area of strength is skill in argument.  I was a an extremely difficult kid, for everyone, including parents, teachers, coaches (until I hit about 15), I argued incessantly, made people explain the simplest of commands to me, always asked why.  For this reason I would never fit in the military, have major issues with authority, and don’t work well in systems where I just have to follow the rules of other’s.  But, I’ve developed a skill for argument and conversation, whether it be written or spoken.

My glaring weakness is being able to write in short form where I produce the content quickly and by stream of thought.  Much, but not all of what I write on this blog is produced in a limited amount of time with very little editing.  What you see on the page is usually produced in less than a few hours.  That isn’t to say I didn’t spend a great deal of time thinking about what I’m writing, but the actual process of putting it down on paper, or the computer for this matter, I don’t spend too much time on.  I also don’t fret over editing.  Where you see typos and misspelling I could really care less.  I do care though about the quality of writing, which can only be improved through editing, and for that I am sorry, I’ve always had to edit my writing to make it great, and I don’t do that here.  But the main point I’m trying to make is that my thoughts are not as well focused in short form blogging and communicated as well as when I have the ability to spend time on organizing them, or directly conversing with others about them.

That brings us to why I love feedback on this blog.  The questions you ask focus my attention and response on specific ideas, allowing me to better communicate my thoughts.  The comments section of the content piece I’ve written is great, and I encourage you to read it.  In fact, below you will find the answer to a specific question that a reader asked which I though was exceptional and really cut to the heart of what I’ve written.

From Matthew Curran:

Funny timing, as I JUST got through watching this talk from Nettwerk Music Group CEO Terry McBride.  Interesting thoughts on content value/ownership becoming less significant, and context being the emerging concept for monetizing.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQOWNU5-nNs

Your thinking is all very sound, but it still seems a bit blurry to me just where the journalism “industry” is headed.  To your idea, sure it makes sense that the best journalists would survive and prosper in the blogosphere by rising to the surface with top notch content.  But if they are able to generate readership, advertising revenue and/or some degree of premium subscriber revenue, why would they need support for their journalism from a “newspaper” or VC and want to share any equity in their publishing product when they obviously did well enough on their own to get noticed and attract an audience in the first place?
If everything is moving toward being free and expected to be as such, how would this not result in the vast majority of content producers eventually not being able to make a living?

By the way, how does Abnormal Returns provide a living for its writer/staff?  I see a few advertisting spots, but not a lot.  Are there other sources of revenue for them?

I can’t quite put my finger on it, but there is something about this trend toward everyone going freelance/independent that worries me.  Musicians have struggled for centuries as “freelance” workers.  Writers too.  But now even journalists, reporters of important news stories?  What’s next?  Economists, teachers,….where does it end?
I don’t know, but I’d say that to a great degree, the world of music has suffered as forgettable pop music has, in the mainstream and monetary gains arena, grown to dwarf other musics that require far more years of study, practice and cultivation of one’s talent.  Would anyone argue that that the songs in the top 10 or top 40 lists in recent years are far less memorable than that of just decades ago?

I’m not sure if I’m really tying this all together very well as it’s a bit foggy to me even as I write  But for Christ’s sake!  I was in the car yesterday listening to whatever AM talk radio station when the quick timecheck, weather and traffic was capped off with a quick news blurb…..”Lil Wayne doesn’t have to go to jail just yet, ’cause he’s got a dentist appointment.” or some shit like that.  WHAT??!?!?!!!!!!!  That’s the news they feel the need to share?

I’ve definitely gotten off on a tangent here.  But there’s something to all this that doesn’t smell right.  That people, not surprisingly the younger generations, should expect more and more to be free seems somehow in line with the general dumbing down of our culture.  Ever shorter attention spans, the “I want it now…” attitude coupled with complete disregard to what is of value and what it takes to produce such value.  The education, experience and expertise that comes only with time, dedication and focus.

Perhaps the ever free and open ideals of the internet will put the world on a crash course with socialism and we’ll all wind up drinking kool-aid some day.

Oy.  Maybe it’s too late for this kind of thinking.
Thus endeth the rant/ramble.  Thanks for letting me get that out.  ;-)

Response from Leigh Drogen:

We need the VC model because it takes a lot of time to build that name for
yourself, your readership, ability to fund your journalism or content
production. Great writers don’t just appear our of thin air, it takes time
to train them, to give them the tools needed to produce great content, the
same way that it takes time and money to train an athlete.

I didn’t say everything was moving to free, I said all content that isn’t
premium doesn’t have the ability to be anything but free from now on. My
next point is extremely important, listen closely. Just because there is an
issue with the business model (publishers no longer being able to sell their
non premium content), doesn’t mean that there has to be a solution. Not
every problem has a solution, I believe there is one that we haven’t found
yet, and if you can come up with it you’ll be the next billionaire, but
don’t dismiss the problem because there isn’t a solution. Their business
model is sunk.

I can’t divulge the business plan behind Abnormal Returns specifically, but
most content aggregators make money on advertising, yes. In some instances
I believe there will be an opportunity to sell premium news services around
the content aggregation model.

I completely agree with you on the dumbing down of news and how hard it is
for freelance artists to make a good living. The news problem is one I’ll
save for another time because it is a whole rant on its own, and an
important one at that. The short answer is this, when publishers realized
that they could make major advertising dollars off giving people the news,
it slowly became more entertainment than “news”. What percentage of the
population wants to hear about academic, scientific, political, and other
such subjects. The majority of people are dumb, and they want to be fed
dumb content that makes them feel good, and entertains them.

On the freelance side, I think you are right to an extent, but I also
believe the opportunities for freelance artists and journalists are
changing. You’ve got to understand that although there are a lot of
freelance people out there, only a very very very small portion of their
work is really worth anything, and that’s how it should be. When everyone
is able to be their own publisher, the price for content goes down and the
quality of the content rises. I see this as a positive thing. If you want
to be a freelance content producer, like a musician, you better be damn good
because I can go listen to someone else for free, in fact, I can go listen
to you for free if I want to download your content illegally. But I will
pay for the content if it’s really that good, I’ve never stolen a Red Hot
Chili Peppers song, I’ve always either bought their albums or downloaded
from iTunes.

The bottom line is that you ask some great questions, and frankly at this
point the answers aren’t all out there, but that doesn’t mean that the
system isn’t busted.