Dr Pangloss: How to make money from the web

It has long been a given that the internet’s inexhaustible usefulness comes courtesy of millions of people willing to provide everything from gossip to software and services at no cost. But is it still inevitable that most people joining the digital age will never profit from their contributions? Increasingly, it seems, the answer may be no.

Take HubPages: a user-generated content site founded in 2006, which this October gained its millionth page. While resources like Wikipedia are created entirely by voluntary activities, HubPages has an explicitly commercial footing. Users create individual pages, in the style of in-depth magazine articles, about any topic they think is of public interest: from “how to make your own yogurt” to “what’s the best cat food?” The site then generates revenues each time a page is viewed, via Google’s advertising program, allocating a hefty 60 per cent of the proceeds to the author and 40 per cent to HubPages itself. “Hubbers,” as users are somewhat unfortunately known, can earn hundreds or even thousands of dollars a month, and retain full ownership of everything they create—a far cry from most traditional blogging and social networking models.

HubPages is now among America’s 60 most visited websites. But another still bolder venture that’s rising rapidly through the ranks is the “group funding” site Kickstarter, which launched last April. Rather than offering its users revenues for content, Kickstarter invites them to pitch innovative schemes to the web at large, inviting investment from everyone and anyone impressed by their notion. Successes range from four students who raised over $200,000 to start a rival to Facebook, to a film based on Donald Miller’s book Blue Like Jazz which, at the time of writing, had $155,000 in pledges. But $400 group-funded art projects also have their place.

It’s early days for the idea that anyone can earn online. But with the barriers between virtual and real undertakings increasingly permeable, it seems fitting that the web is gradually challenging the belief that most digital labours will never bring real rewards.