Name: Anonymous 2006-12-06 17:12
Once again, it's donate or die time at 4chan. At the same time, 7chan and 12chan are also experiencing economic difficulties and both chans face the looming probability of having to close down. 420chan has just barely climbed out of their dept hole, having been closed for close to 6months.
Why is it that the chan model is so inheriently unstable? To most people, the root cause is obvious (bandwidth doesn't grow on tress). But there are non-obvious causes too.
Most "chans" have boards which blatently violate the terms of service of even the most daring finance company (7chan's /i/, 420chan's drug boards, 4chan's /b/ and 12chan). This has the effect of cutting off any providers' air supply at the root, since donations become either impossible or impractical ('hay guiz send me sum moeny orderz kay?lol').
This is further aggravated by the entitlement culture which, while prevelant all over chanland, is even worse given that the chans are mostly populated by torrenting freeloaders who believe in the validity of illicitly downloading the intellectual property of manga artists, musical artists and movie studios.
Once you scratch the surface of the "chan demographic" its' easy to see that it is made up of people who are hostile to the idea of being active participants in the eEconomy, which leads to the idea of participating in the chan eEconomy laughable in their eyes, and potential donators are scoffed and discourage from donating funds.
While I have no idea what it will take to bring about a positive paridigm shift and make the idea of eEconomic participation palatable to the core constituency of chan consumers, it's undoubtly certain that it is past time to begin the dicourse regarding how to make the chan model economically viable.
For my part I am unsure what form the solution will take in the end, but I'm certain it involves bringing back snacks.
And also dongs.
Why is it that the chan model is so inheriently unstable? To most people, the root cause is obvious (bandwidth doesn't grow on tress). But there are non-obvious causes too.
Most "chans" have boards which blatently violate the terms of service of even the most daring finance company (7chan's /i/, 420chan's drug boards, 4chan's /b/ and 12chan). This has the effect of cutting off any providers' air supply at the root, since donations become either impossible or impractical ('hay guiz send me sum moeny orderz kay?lol').
This is further aggravated by the entitlement culture which, while prevelant all over chanland, is even worse given that the chans are mostly populated by torrenting freeloaders who believe in the validity of illicitly downloading the intellectual property of manga artists, musical artists and movie studios.
Once you scratch the surface of the "chan demographic" its' easy to see that it is made up of people who are hostile to the idea of being active participants in the eEconomy, which leads to the idea of participating in the chan eEconomy laughable in their eyes, and potential donators are scoffed and discourage from donating funds.
While I have no idea what it will take to bring about a positive paridigm shift and make the idea of eEconomic participation palatable to the core constituency of chan consumers, it's undoubtly certain that it is past time to begin the dicourse regarding how to make the chan model economically viable.
For my part I am unsure what form the solution will take in the end, but I'm certain it involves bringing back snacks.
And also dongs.