The Creator Economy Is in Crisis. Now Let’s Fix it.

How do we build a healthier creator economy?

4. Creator interdependence and solidarity: Going forward, my hope is that we can build platforms and mechanisms that incentivize mutual support between creators, where one creator’s success does not come at the expense of another’s.

But just as the gig economy mode of work brought about negative consequences, strong parallels are emerging between the gig economy and creator economy, rooted in the commoditization of work and erosion of worker leverage. For online creators today, a handful of large social media platforms serve as gatekeepers for finding and connecting with audie... See more

In centuries past, worker rights and worker-friendly company environments didn’t just emerge spontaneously, but were hard-won. Likewise, creator empowerment will be the product of concerted efforts by founders, investors, creators, and the broader tech community to craft structures and platforms that prioritize creator control and ownership.

Platforms today are double-edged swords for creators: creators rely on them to grow their audience, but also want to be able to reduce their dependence on them over time.

2. Credibly neutral creator mechanisms: Vitalik Buterin wrote about the importance of building mechanisms that are credibly neutral, in which he described, “a mechanism is credibly neutral if just by looking at the mechanism’s design, it is easy to see that the mechanism does not discriminate for or against any specific people.” The four elements o... See more

Numerous startups are attempting to help creators set up their standalone, owned properties online; earn more from fewer, truer fans; and lessen their dependence on social media platforms. But unless we radically change the foundation of the creator economy—how creators find and connect to a community in the first place—these solutions are incremen... See more

Creator labor entails the same job and income insecurity as gig work. In the gig work world, clients can end contracts at any time, and providers can be swapped out easily. The same can be said for creators: if users are not satisfied with the content or offering, another creator is just a swipe away. Underscoring this job insecurity is a black-box... See more

Gig economy platforms’ lock-in isn’t predicated on controlling physical capital or manufacturing equipment. Instead, their capital is data that they gather and control—locations of every network participant, the record of all events and interactions, reputation and feedback scores, and market-clearing prices—all of which strengthens their network e... See more

3. Creator-friendly business models: Offering more direct monetization models (where users pay creators) can encourage creators to align their content with what end users value, versus creating content that maximizes watch time or virality.