What makes something valuable?
Scarcity dictates value, at least that’s what we’re told. Diamonds are more difficult to come by, therefore they are worth more than other stones or metals.
But the economy of the arts and the internet is different.
Scarcity is not something that diminishes or increases the value of art or things posted on the internet, if it was we would post a lot less to social.
Our algorithm overlords would have us believe that popularity is value. The more likes and views, the better it is. Attention equals value.
We see this play out all the time in the information age we live in: that which is popular and prevalent is more valuable and becomes more popular because of it. The artist that can gain and maintain popularity is the artist that continues to increase in value and have work.
That which is popular is seen as more valuable than that which is less popular, even if the less popular thing is objectively better. Somehow, we have been tricked into believing that if something gets more attention, it is worth more.
And this leads us to some important questions: as someone who attempts to create art and put it out into the world, does the attention that people give it make it more valuable than anyone else’s contribution? Should we believe the hype that we see on the internet? Does popularity truly equal value?
Even in the world of the internet, I would argue that it does not.
What is the value of a view? What is the value of a like?
Advertisers put dollar values on those things, Google and Facebook put dollar values on those. But what does it actually cost the consumer, the person doing the viewing and the liking? What investment does a viewer of my content make to watch a video or read a post and click a button with a thumbs up icon on it?
If we’re being honest with ourselves, the cost to each individual person is low. It takes very little effort to consume content online, and it takes almost no work to click buttons. It mostly takes time.
Time has it’s own value, and advertisers will do anything to get some of that time on their products, but ultimately we get to decide what our time is worth to us, not corporations, and the time that we spend consuming content doesn’t always indicate how much we enjoyed it or what we believe it’s worth.
How many times have you watched a movie and thought to yourself “I immediately regret my decision”? And how many times have you liked a post without even thinking about it because a friend posted it, or because you wanted that person to follow you on social and not because you actually liked it?
We’ve all done it.
We watch and like things because we’ve been trained to do it, because we’ve been tricked into thinking that if we watched it, we should like it, even if we didn’t. And those algorithms love to keep track of the time we spend watching things, and they feed us more of it, even if we didn’t like it.
Sometimes we just watch things because we see that others have too.
Have we become such a herd that we only listen to or watch things that have been watched by a lot people? Are we so addicted to the idea that the only things worth buying are those with a 4 1/2 star rating and more than 1000 reviews? Is the only music worth listening to that which is produced by the mega stars? Are movies that never make it to the box office less valuable because they were seen and reviewed by fewer people?
Most people, I think, would answer that this isn’t the case; that all heartfelt contributions, all efforts to bring good and speak truth are valuable regardless of whether anyone notices. But we don’t act that way. And in the internet of today I don’t think we can. It won’t allow us to.
Don’t get me wrong, there is value in honest reviews, and there is at least some credence to the idea that if a lot of people watch, read or listen to something, there is probably something worthwhile about it, but not always.
Popularity is not always actuated by quality, it often has more to do with marketing. Those who speak the loudest and look the best often win the popularity contest regardless of the inherent quality of their work, so long as that quality is high enough to not be hated. Although, sometimes being comically bad is why some things get famous.
The system our world runs on is a popularity contest, for both good and bad content. These platforms are dead set on commanding our time and attention to sell advertisements to companies who know that by spamming our eyes and ears with ads that they can take up residence in our subconscious and eventually convince us to buy.
The design of these platforms and products leads us to believe that by posting more often we can increase the value of what we say, that by being the loudest and most prominent voice that our voice is more important, and therefore more valuable than the others.
But, in a way, the opposite tends to happen.
What we see more often is that those who want to win the popularity contest must post more often and more brazen content. Very often they either capitulate to appease the algorithm and decrease the quality of what they put out, hire people to maintain the quality of their work while putting out more and more of it, or accept that their voice will be drowned out by the louder, more persistent, and well funded voices.
By giving in to the desires of the algorithm we just spam the world with whatever will get us clicks and views, and not what truly brings value to the world.
There are exceptions to this, of course. There are people who continue to put out great content that makes a difference and maintains a level of quality at a rapid pace, but I would argue that many more cave in to the desire for popularity by sacrificing quality to do it.
It’s a sad, but seemingly necessary part of our lives that we must derive our view of the world based on the whims of the popular opinion of people that we can’t even confirm are real people, and we are constantly barraged with the idea that designing content to appease an algorithm is tantamount to success.
But, back to my initial question: if this thing that I’m writing is never seen or heard, If my words echo into the void of some server farm but never in the ears of a single, solitary soul; are my words still valuable?
Is that simple song you sang to your grandmother in hospice important? Is that poem you wrote just for that special someone still beautiful? Is that prayer you sent off into the air, unsure whether anyone was listening still valuable?
The internet at large may have a different answer, but if you ask me: yes!
Your voice is valuable! Your songs and your poems are beautiful, even for the audience of one. You are valuable. You are needed. And the number of people who notice that is irrelevant!
The world needs people who put good into the world, not for views and likes, but because we want the world to be better and brighter and happier. And if one person benefits greatly, who’s to say that that isn’t more valuable than if a million people benefit a little?
The value we bring cannot always be defined by the number of people we reached or the number of dollars we generated. But it should be defined by the difference we made in the lives of the people we did reach, even if it was only one person.
The impact we make isn’t easily quantified and — in fact — may be impossible to truly quantify, but quantifying that shouldn’t be our goal.
I recognize the irony of me saying these things on a platform that is very much geared to encourage the opposite of what I’m saying, but I’ll say it all the same:
Let your light shine, and know that that light has value.
Even if no one sees it, it still might (at the very least) light your own way. And if you’re lucky, perhaps it will make some small difference in the life of someone else, and that is enough value to be worth it, in my estimation.
So, let’s a make a difference for the better in this world in whatever way we can, and not worry about the number of people that we reach. Let’s be more concerned with the quality of our message and the difference it can make.
Because, in the end, that is the more worthwhile goal.