On the value of editing
Linda sent me a link to Sara Perez’ post “Content is becoming a Commodity” on ReadWriteWeb which focuses on the problem that modern bloggers have hanging on to their words and other content which can be vacuumed up by any number of more-or-less legitimate enterprises that try to monetize it while rarely giving credit (or, especially, payment) where due.
Ms. Perez quotes blogger Steve Hodson, who decries the devaluation of his ‘brand’ in a landscape where anyone can snatch his words and repurpose them. This set me to thinking (always a dangerous thing), and now to setting down my thoughts about a couple of issues that I think lurk behind Ms. Perez’ and Mr. Hodson’s thoughts.
“Information wants to be free.” The problem Mr. Hodson elucidates has been with us since before Gutenberg. The problem predates publishing (I believe wandering minstrels used to wrangle over material), the Internet and will likely vex media yet to come. Once you publish in any medium, you’re vulnerable to everything from people appropriating snippets to rampant plagiarism and piracy.
The only response, in my humble opinion is to just get over it: ‘losing’ your content is both a good and a bad thing. On the one hand, shifty characters with vast automated link farms, each displaying Google ads, will glean some pennies from your (and my) content. On the other hand, wide dissemination may introduce you to new readers who will seek you out. Even when your name is stripped from your words, Google allows the enterprising would-be reader to find you.
In an ocean of information, editing is more valuable than content. As supply outstrips demand, the price of a given commodity goes to zero. No one has the time to sift even a day’s new content much less the whole of the web. Net content is actually worth less than zero, in the sense that there is so much, the sheer bulk obscures the content most readers want.
Almost 20 years ago, Will Hearst told me, in the newsroom of his San Francisco Examiner, that editing would become steadily more valuable.