The Rise Of The 'Professional Amateur' And The Fall Of Gated, Exclusionary Clubs

[RickJ]

I cam across an interesting TechDirt article,
The Rise Of The 'Professional Amateur' And The Fall Of Gated, Exclusionary 'Clubs', I thought may be of interest.  It talks about how barriers of entry into creative fields such as ours are falling.     

[Babar]

Someone wrote an article about me? 

But yeah, stuff like Youtube, AGS, heck, even blogs and such stuff has definitely opened up these fields to way more people. But....isn't this a pretty old news? People have been talking about it since the internet, since personal websites, since youtube, since blogs, etc.

[Igor Hardy]

This bit I found the most interesting:

The magic of the internet is therefore this: It substitutes time spent getting into the club with time spent finding fans. Expertise with experience. Legitimacy with audience. Jargon with generosity.

Although I feel this bit:

And for those with the talent to do it well come the rewards because niche audiences that blossom into tribes exist for almost anything you can think of.

may be a bit overly optimistic.

[Baron]

Although I feel this bit:

And for those with the talent to do it well come the rewards because niche audiences that blossom into tribes exist for almost anything you can think of.

may be a bit overly optimistic.

I disagree.  The one guy who bought our game may yet blossom into a niche tribe.  He just needs more watering.

[Ali]

I'm not sure we should be too optimistic about these developments. I think it feeds into the philosophy that it's OK not to pay for creative works.

While I think the draconian response of copyright holders to piracy is absurd, archaic and counter-productive, not all art can be made by hobbyists doing art for art's sake. Artists need time and resources, we need to have professional artists if we want to have great art.

I think the internet has done great things for video games, because it's allowed people from Dave Gilbert to Telltale to make niche games and a living at the same time. It's been a blessing and a curse for writers, filmmakers and musicians and I think we are all looking for ways to create sustainable cottage industries in those areas. I hope it can be done, but it's not inevitable.

[Igor Hardy]

I believe the "it's OK not to pay" way of thinking is actually dying. It might become financially impossible for bigger publishers to maintain themselves though.

Preconceptions about what does it mean to be successful and what does a quality work consist of are going to be quickly changing too. For many people it was all about getting into a "club" or being endorsed by one of the "clubs".