Most authors and artists are struggling to maintain a sustainable career. Worse still, more and more authors can no longer make a living from their creative works in the online environment. To make the Internet a boon for content creators everywhere, I have a simple idea: free payment.
Free payment means that people have free access to digital works and then pay freely for valuable work. In other words, anyone can study a digital work first and later decide for themselves how valuable the work is and how much to pay for it. Free payment could benefit people, creators and our future for three reasons.
Firstly, free payment gives everyone free access to intellectual works. Young people and the poor benefit most from free access to the knowledge and wisdom of humanity, as they cannot afford to buy a large quantity of copyrighted works.
Secondly, free access allows creative works to reach the widest possible audience, while free payment attracts the largest possible buyers to enrich authors.
Thirdly, free payment and free access help shift any economy of overconsumption from material growth to intellectual growth. Free payment allows people to vote with their wallets for excellent works, supporting fair remuneration for value creation. Free access encourages masterpieces to compete for our leisure time, advancing human intelligence for a better future.
If authors want to try new ways to get better remuneration, I suggest introducing free payment for their creative works. It’s to be expected that few people will pay in the initial stage of introducing free payment, but our intellectual level and our willingness to pay for valuable works will steadily increase when we can freely enjoy quality content.
