The Answer Factory: Fast, Disposable, and Profitable as Hell • Hacker News Board

Re: The Answer Factory: Fast, Disposable, and Profitable as Hell

#31

Post by byrneseyeview » Thu, Oct 29, 2009, 12:24 PM UTC

forensic wrote: post #29

While it is a bit of a race to the bottom, it doesn't have to be. Especially if you include the PG-style democratic effect, where the good eHow articles float to the top and the bad sink, which creates a feedback loop that rewards quality. As quality becomes more important, the eHow statistical analysis will demonstrate that and eHow will adjust the process to increase quality. Alternatively, they might just stick to…

Whoa, there. They do look at the data, and do what the data tell them makes the most sense. That's what that means. You can't say that you would do what your analysis tells you is right, and then decide what you'll conclude in advance!

Also, you might have noticed that the "democratic" parts of the web are mostly terrible.

Re: The Answer Factory: Fast, Disposable, and Profitable as Hell

#32

Post by adw » Thu, Oct 29, 2009, 1:54 PM UTC

jordanb wrote: post #12

The implications of this article are depressing. While I usually keep a tiny violin handy for when I run across writers bemoaning the death of journalism, the bleakness of an Internet full of crappy howto videos busted out for $20 a pop has gotten to me. We already have far too much slapdash, zero effort link-baiting blog drivel. But the worst part is the Orwellian (or perhaps Huxley-ian?) idea of all those people be…

There is a rattling great market opportunity here. Assuming Demand Media and friends manage to complete the race to the bottom - and why not, it's happened in every market - there's going to be a prestige knowledge-brokering market springing up.

Translate "personal shopper" to the limitless library and now you're talking. Tricky to scale outside niches - so it's most likely not a scale, VC business - but there's a million very nice consultancies waiting here for Internet safari guides...

Re: The Answer Factory: Fast, Disposable, and Profitable as Hell

#33

Post by thetrumanshow » Thu, Oct 29, 2009, 3:14 PM UTC

petercooper wrote: post #26

brandnewlow wrote: post #13

I told a bunch of journalism friends about this over beers tonight. A few of them were really depressed by this. One of them is actually on the margins of it. He just started writing for an AOL site and said that this is the direction they're going to start going with for their weblogs inc. sites. He gets a list of topics culled from Google Zietgeist and other sources that his editor wants him to write short posts ab…

While the lack of a strong editorial voice can be a negative, the pay surely isn't. As you note, $50 a pop for "short posts." For someone who's skilled in an area (as most Weblogs Inc writers were, at least) $50 to put out a 300-400 word post in 30 minutes or so is pretty good pay.

Yes, but $50 in exchange for 300-400 words and a small slice of your credibility isn't a good trade.

However, if they don't have to put their names on the article then you're right, it is a good deal.

Re: The Answer Factory: Fast, Disposable, and Profitable as Hell

#34

Post by jcl » Thu, Oct 29, 2009, 3:20 PM UTC

greyman wrote: post #23

jordanb wrote: post #12

The implications of this article are depressing. While I usually keep a tiny violin handy for when I run across writers bemoaning the death of journalism, the bleakness of an Internet full of crappy howto videos busted out for $20 a pop has gotten to me. We already have far too much slapdash, zero effort link-baiting blog drivel. But the worst part is the Orwellian (or perhaps Huxley-ian?) idea of all those people be…

What is depressing is that Google likes that kind of content, when a lot of cheap articles are pumped in furiously. If they were after quality, they could de-rank Demand and that would make them out of business quickly. But they wouldn't do it, since advertising dollars are at stake. But on the other side, it isn't that terribly depressing, since their site will occupy only one slot in the search results. So it is st…

At the end of the day, though, people want quality. If a low-quality SEOed article appears higher in the search rankings than a high-quality article, it is a flaw in ranking algorithm -- a weakness that other search engines can exploit.

I think Google is smart enough to realize that search dominance is their most valuable asset... that the money from search dominance dwarfs the money from favoring crappy content that matches ad keywords. This is just another step in the struggle between Google and the search engine optimizers.

(The deal between Demand and YouTube is curious, though... If the "real world" worked like that, prime time television would be filled with shows about cars, beverages, and pills.)

Re: The Answer Factory: Fast, Disposable, and Profitable as Hell

#35

Post by chuck_taylor » Thu, Oct 29, 2009, 3:37 PM UTC

10ren wrote: post #21

jordanb wrote: post #12

The implications of this article are depressing. While I usually keep a tiny violin handy for when I run across writers bemoaning the death of journalism, the bleakness of an Internet full of crappy howto videos busted out for $20 a pop has gotten to me. We already have far too much slapdash, zero effort link-baiting blog drivel. But the worst part is the Orwellian (or perhaps Huxley-ian?) idea of all those people be…

Just BTW: Regarding the time to prepare the article itself, it's standard practice for companies to send press releases to magazines/articles that are already ready for publication as is . It makes sense: they will benefit massively from the publicity, and they have the best access to the material. Who knows, in this case they may even have included the "too slick" passage for verisimilitude (with an ironic wink). Mo…

Most likely Wired didn't do anything based on a press release. The P.R. industry would like you to believe they are able to drive the news agenda, but when it comes to the Wireds and The New York Timeses of the world, it's rare for a press release to lead to a story of this magnitude.

Most likely, Demand Studios' P.R. people freaked out when Wired inquired.

This story likely took weeks to report and write. A graphic artist probably spent at least a week preparing the chart. Good journalism takes a lot of effort, and so few people realize that.

As someone who has been paid to write and edit news for 30 years, this article was pretty depressing, but I already knew about Demand Studios. And you know what? It looks like they take good care of their writers, at least in the karma department. These seem to be folks who have always wanted to be paid to write but never had the opportunity to get paid for it, enjoy surfing the Web, and can bang out three or four of these articles in a day and have some good walking-around-money.

They seem to be mostly American, but at some point I'm sure the Third World will be recruited to drive the price down even further. Seen what they are paying on Mechanical Turk?

Re: The Answer Factory: Fast, Disposable, and Profitable as Hell

#36

Post by chuck_taylor » Thu, Oct 29, 2009, 3:43 PM UTC

petercooper wrote: post #26

brandnewlow wrote: post #13

I told a bunch of journalism friends about this over beers tonight. A few of them were really depressed by this. One of them is actually on the margins of it. He just started writing for an AOL site and said that this is the direction they're going to start going with for their weblogs inc. sites. He gets a list of topics culled from Google Zietgeist and other sources that his editor wants him to write short posts ab…

While the lack of a strong editorial voice can be a negative, the pay surely isn't. As you note, $50 a pop for "short posts." For someone who's skilled in an area (as most Weblogs Inc writers were, at least) $50 to put out a 300-400 word post in 30 minutes or so is pretty good pay.

Word count is not an indication of the effort involved. Itg's not merely a matter of typing in words like a monkey. You have to know about which you write. The more you know, likely the more time it took you to learn it. Time is money, words are just words.

Re: The Answer Factory: Fast, Disposable, and Profitable as Hell

#37

Post by forensic » Thu, Oct 29, 2009, 4:57 PM UTC

byrneseyeview wrote: post #31

forensic wrote: post #29

While it is a bit of a race to the bottom, it doesn't have to be. Especially if you include the PG-style democratic effect, where the good eHow articles float to the top and the bad sink, which creates a feedback loop that rewards quality. As quality becomes more important, the eHow statistical analysis will demonstrate that and eHow will adjust the process to increase quality. Alternatively, they might just stick to…

Whoa, there. They do look at the data, and do what the data tell them makes the most sense. That's what that means. You can't say that you would do what your analysis tells you is right, and then decide what you'll conclude in advance! Also, you might have noticed that the "democratic" parts of the web are mostly terrible.

What I'm saying is that the quality-effect would take time to become prominent.

First they have to profit off all the low-hanging fruit simply because there is no competition.

Then, once competition starts to build up, there is no more low-hanging fruit left and they are forced to compete on quality.

Over time, a democratic effect takes place and quality rises.

There is a difference between saying, "Cat pics are more popular than articles" and saying, "This eHow video is higher quality than this other site's HowTo video"

Cat pics don't compete with articles except on reddit and digg which love to compare apples and oranges. In a google search though, they are totally separate. So yeah maybe eHow will make 10 times more cat pics than informed videos but the point is that the cat pics will be automatically filtered out unless you search for "cat pics".

Re: The Answer Factory: Fast, Disposable, and Profitable as Hell

#38

Post by 10ren » Thu, Oct 29, 2009, 6:54 PM UTC

chuck_taylor wrote: post #35

10ren wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just BTW: Regarding the time to prepare the article itself, it's standard practice for companies to send press releases to magazines/articles that are already ready for publication as is . It makes sense: they will benefit massively from the publicity, and they have the best access to the material. Who knows, in this case they may even have included the "too slick" passage for verisimilitude (with an ironic wink). Mo…

Most likely Wired didn't do anything based on a press release. The P.R. industry would like you to believe they are able to drive the news agenda, but when it comes to the Wireds and The New York Timeses of the world, it's rare for a press release to lead to a story of this magnitude. Most likely, Demand Studios' P.R. people freaked out when Wired inquired. This story likely took weeks to report and write. A graphic…

I wonder if we'll ever know, factually, who wrote to whom first?

I don't mean to slight wired; but I'm sure that many technology companies would like to be covered by wired, and if they have any sense, they'd prepare an article in the most convenient form for wired, and send it to them - and the guy running Demand definitely knows how to make things happen at this point. They wouldn't have any control over what Wired did with it, of course.

I wouldn't worry about it too much - it's just a drop in the ocean, and there are lots of other sources of information on the web. Probably, it's fair to say that having a crappy $20 video is quite a bit better than nothing. And if there's a few results to a google search, most people will look at more than one.

Example: I had a blocked toilet yesterday, google came up with a several excellent hits on it. I tried the suggestions in order, and problem solved. The internet is pretty cool.

I guess the depressing part is that higher quality can't be supported by adwords alone - it would seem, anyway. I think quality is often best rewarded in niches audiences and uses, where quality really matters.

Re: The Answer Factory: Fast, Disposable, and Profitable as Hell

#39

Post by petercooper » Thu, Oct 29, 2009, 8:27 PM UTC

thetrumanshow wrote: post #33

petercooper wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While the lack of a strong editorial voice can be a negative, the pay surely isn't. As you note, $50 a pop for "short posts." For someone who's skilled in an area (as most Weblogs Inc writers were, at least) $50 to put out a 300-400 word post in 30 minutes or so is pretty good pay.

Yes, but $50 in exchange for 300-400 words and a small slice of your credibility isn't a good trade. However, if they don't have to put their names on the article then you're right, it is a good deal.

It depends if they're writing crap that's below their station. If you're getting a heavy investigative journalist to pump out this stuff, it could hurt their credibility. If it's just a niche expert pumping out small news pieces that have some small insight behind it, I can't see how it could hurt.

Re: The Answer Factory: Fast, Disposable, and Profitable as Hell

#40

Post by petercooper » Thu, Oct 29, 2009, 8:29 PM UTC

chuck_taylor wrote: post #36

petercooper wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While the lack of a strong editorial voice can be a negative, the pay surely isn't. As you note, $50 a pop for "short posts." For someone who's skilled in an area (as most Weblogs Inc writers were, at least) $50 to put out a 300-400 word post in 30 minutes or so is pretty good pay.

Word count is not an indication of the effort involved. Itg's not merely a matter of typing in words like a monkey. You have to know about which you write. The more you know, likely the more time it took you to learn it. Time is money, words are just words.

Word count is not an indication of the effort involved.

If it's for writing small news bits, it can be. Let's say you're a total expert with using GMail and you have to write a couple of posts linking to GMail news, the occasional tip, etc, each day - you can probably bash short posts out in no time.

You have the many hundreds of hours invested in actually become the expert in the first place, but I doubt anyone becomes an expert so they can write $50 a pop pieces - so that cash is extra value, not a payback for the time you spent learning (as is the case with a professional's fees).