Where the People Are by risa
Here is a strange twist in the pioneering world of internet development. Yaro Starak (the author of the “Entrepreneur’s Journey” blog) reports on ForumLaunch, an online business that tweaks paying for content toward community building:
Forums are a hugely important media for the internet, they create a layered and organized space for the exponential expansion of the wash of public opinion that has begun to make its power known in the blogosphere. I think this business model will make money while contributing to the social and political evolution of the Internet.
A few hard working people can make a forum come alive, and paying for that focused attention makes a kind of sense. You can see how there would be some cause for grumbling about paying for community, but there is a distinction here: forum posters are not paid to praise the site or to ‘objectively’ describe products the site is trying to sell or gain advertizing money from. They are paid to spark discussion. Having an actual opinion, standing up for it, but also listening, responding to, and learning from other people’s opinions is the best way to do this. The writers who are paid to post in the forums could demonstrate possible forum behavior, as well as the possible depth and integrity of posts. This business model could effectively travel the internet setting sparks and starting fires; creating life in spaces for all the kinds of conversations that are not quite happening yet, and building links between different communities and disciplines.
If you’d like to check out the field, and the range of topics among the most active forums, you might start at
the Big Boards Forum Directory. If you like working with writers and are excited by this business idea, you might take Yaro up on his business proposition- you’ll find it toward the bottom of his article.
Risa Dickens
Leave a Comment