Zach WeinersmithCan I just say, as a guy who writes and draws for a living, it sucks the extent to which modern artists have to think about the distribution channel as opposed to just making good stuff. 25 year old artists juggle 10 platforms, regularly updating their understanding of how each one's algorithm works. I dunno the solution, but the fragmentation and algorithmization of everything has eaten so much time that should've been spent on craft.
Lizard@ZachWeinersmith And this is why agents /publishers (and similar in other fields) evolved in the first place. They (allegedly) took on the work of doing the non-creative stuff, leaving the creator free to create. And eventually, they became gatekeepers. And then the pendulum swung back with the rise of the internet, but then it, too, became centralized -- why chase down a thousand blogs if there's a site like Instagram or YouTube? But as you note, mastering those cuts into creating. So it goes.