Building the Middle Class of the Creator Economy

What is certainly true is this: Creator platforms flourish when they provide opportunity for anyone to grow and succeed.

But while some have been propelled to massive stardom, examples of a wide swath of the population achieving financial security from these platforms are few and far between. The current creator landscape more closely resembles an economy in which wealth is concentrated at the top. On Patreon, only 2% of creators made the federal minimum wage of $1,1... See more

Launching a new platform, Zhu said, was like starting a new country: Getting users to move from an established network that had an ossified economy and social classes to a new network requires the possibility of success—the lure of the American Dream. Furthermore, the new social network had to create upward mobility for all users, to “make sure the... See more

Societies and platforms flourish when there is a path for everyone to have upward mobility, achieve financial security, and learn and grow. The beautiful thing is, in the real world as well as in the digital world, it’s up to us to build this path.

-Create passive (or almost-passive) income opportunities for creators: While there is significant revenue concentration, for all creators, the sales represent passive income (after products are initially created), allowing creators to scale earnings without scaling time.

-Offer a form of Universal Creative Income (UCI)

-Allow creators to capitalize on superfans:

But for content platforms, the move to digital content hasn’t been correlated with a burgeoning long tail: the top creators are massively successful, while long-tail creators are barely getting by.

Ever since Wired magazine editor Chris Anderson first published his “Long Tail” theory in 2004, the idea has been endlessly reinforced, contradicted, and debated. He argued that the internet’s removal of physical limitations (local audiences, scarce shelf space) would empower niche products and creators to flourish.