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Does anyone else hate how everyone is trying to make money all the time?

2d 22h ago by lemmy.ml/u/marcie in asklemmy@lemmy.ml

I had to deal with some guy at work trying to do some tiktok video and including me in it so I could complement his side gig or some shit (and likely only including me because women get views). And if I complain too much about being included in their grift everyone will shit on me for being a karen or for not helping him with it. Jesus fucking christ, I hate people that try to constantly plaster their face and name on everything to make money. Fuck youtubers, fuck tiktok, fuck ads, stop stealing peoples work for a quick buck 'by doing commentary', leave me the fuck alone

I don't see why you should put your face in his video if he isn't sharing the money. It sounds like he wants free labor to me.

i would normally tell him to fuck off but the chief leeches were there and wanted me to. whats worse is he has a somewhat large amount of followers and the chief leeches like him being there because of exposure.

Jesus what kind of hellscape of a job do you have where you’re being forced into viral marketing for something that is unrelated to your company?!

i work in a software security department at a large corporation. I HATE IT HERE.

Why would software security need (or even want) “exposure?”

the corporation has a large financial wing, why they think im a good target to include in some idiots tiktok video is your guess. i dont speak linkedin or tiktok

Sounds like they aren't paying you enough if your role includes being a performer.

They probably see it as "woman in tech is rare, we show we have one"

They like this until he accidentally leaks something classified like the idiots that would upload their "Day in the life of" videos typing in pincodes and passwords and the wrong person sees it or goes back to see it an old video. Some horrible long term thinking for a software security team to allow

What the fuck? I was like dead certain that you were stuck with a bunch of high schoolers at a grocery store or something. That should never be happening anywhere remotely close to a cube farm.

Best strategy is to play dumb. "Hello, [fuckface's manager], I have some concerns about the tiktok content [fuckface] is making for the company and some questions about my job responsibilities in relation to it. [Fuckface] pretty regularly interrupts my work to request me to act in these videos and it is getting in the way of my usual duties. If my participation is required, could you please let me know in writing? I'll also need to discuss with my manager about how this should be prioritized and scheduled alongside my other job duties."

Force their awareness in a way that doesn't immediately look like an assassination. The more you can get in writing the more rope this guy makes to hang himself with. If somehow they claim it's actually work related, keep pushing the edges of "I just want to be sure" until his channel is company property or he shoots himself in the foot.

Alternatively, get paid to intentionally do bad acting. "Oh, I've never been good on camera, sorry!"

“You know what my side hustle ad needs? A GIRL”

“Hey, I think a girl works for me. Let’s just use her.”

“Great thanks bro!”

Shit like this makes me want to become a terrorist. I wont, but I’m starting to get why other people do.

At a random time, when nothing is happening, hand him a "paid talent release form".

If you look up "talent release form" it's what allows a creator to use materials with another person. As it stands now, he asked you to participate but did not have you sign a release (with no fee), so you own partial rights to income from that video.

Say to him: "Since you are a pretty big creator I assume you're familiar with releases. I grabbed a standard one to give you rights to my previously included videos, and here's another for any future videos including me for a 50% share. I'll sign them after you approve and sign unless you have a standard set you would like to use"

This makes it a business transaction, vs a "leave me alone". He won't want to figure out how to pay you, so he'll probably stop.

My sister is so into this mindset but doesn't do anything about it, it's so annoying.

Every conversation with her ends up being about how to monetize something. Fucking A, I'm not gonna start a food blog and sell ads, I just wanna make dumplings!! I'm not gonna stream my boyfriend and I playing games, we're just trying to relax! I'm not a brand or a product I'm just a person, get off it.

I hate that so much. "Oh, this hobby only brings you joy and happiness? Don't you know you could make money out of it?"

I'm that neighbor thats really, really into Halloween. My whole family is. We do a pretty big yard thing every year and this year we had the scene change every week to tell a bigger story. On Halloween handing out candy and goodies, everyone was stoked and wanted to stop and say how rad it was and how much fun it was to watch over the course of the month. Except one person. She just kept on going about how I should charge people to see it. Dude, first and foremost, I'm not going to make one of the few things I find true joy in doing another goddamned chore. Also, how the fuck would I keep people from just looking at my front yard? How do you expect me to manage that?

One good thing came of it though, after her insistence again and again I told her the only practical way to charge admition would be to do an actual walk through haunted house in my back yard. So the neighbors and fam and I are going to do just that. But for free because fuck that. I might charge her a dollar though because I'm super petty.

I hate the idea that you shouldn't freely provide joy to those around you for the sheer satisfaction of making it. The mammonite brain rot runs deep in a lot of people unfortunately

Should've charged only that neighbor for the "privilege".

My one friend is the same. He laments how little ambition I have for being so creative.

I create beautiful things for fun and for people I care about. Any time I've done it got money, it has slowly but surely sucked the soul from it. No thanks. I'll be happy with my creativity over here without a ton of money.

Capitol cuck mindset we need to get off it

Sorry if this is too personal, but does she have, or has she had in the past, membership in a communist party a hobby which she did as only an amateur? It's hard for me to take the perspective of someone who doesn't seem to understand how monetizing a passion can completely ruin it.

the thing that gets me is these people don't realize there's a much easier way to make $ not working...just play the stock market, that's what all the big rich fucks who don't do any real work do. it's one big casino that most people buy into passively, especially in bubbles like this...it's incredibly easy to make shitloads of $. it's so easy that you quickly lose any interest in "grinding".

it's certainly not fulfilling though...gambling is no way to make a living.

The job market sucks and it's only getting worse. A full-time job doesn't provide the same standard of living it did for previous generations. I don't like how there's so much pressure to have a side hustle that makes money versus just having a hobby you enjoy, but for some people that's their only option. But I don't hate them, I hate the system.

That being said, it wasn't cool for him to include you in his video. You have every right to push back and avoid this in the future.

It does suck. Watching all my highschool friends slowly lose the light in their eyes as the economy tightened its grip, becoming all more desperate just for basic necessities. The only way any of us can fix this is by making sure no one is run ragged by the fear of this fake ass scarcity.

The only way any of us can fix this is by making sure no one is run ragged by the fear of this fake ass scarcity.

By getting rid of capitalism, right? Right?

May we cast off these chains as comrades :)

Yes! :)

Hear me out, what if we use capitalism to fight capitalism. I'm sure it'll work this time guys.

Most certainly! :)

At least you have empathy. My family deride me for struggling with affording housing my whole adult life. At least I dont have to see them more then a couple times a year. Love those douchebags.

It's not you, I can tell you that. I won't lie I feel that empathy because I was simply exposed to the horrors of capitalism before they were, my father losing his job, my family losing their house and having to work in a factory as a child. I can't blame them for the conditions we're all in.

do it in exchange of a share of the profit. nothing turns people off like sharing.

When someone asks for something, always tune your radio to station WIIFM. (What’s in it for me?)

I absolutely hate it. I just want to BE but that is impossible because we've turned modern life into an insufferable game.

I want to work a reasonable amount, and have enough time and money to create for my own pleasure if I so choose. I don't even mind content creation in theory, I see it no different from writing or doing art. It's the constant pursuit of more, more, more, both status and money, that gets to me. I want freedom, security, and comfort.

Yeah I mean if that's what people enjoy I'm not going to yuck anyone's yum (to a point), as long as they are not pestering people around them. Unfortunately that's what gets clicks a lot of times, so you have these people creating these situations, harassing people at home and in foreign countries, creating all this fake drama between themselves. Yes I just wish more people would be happy with what they have and appreciate the things and people around them more (myself included.) All the flaunting and celeb worship is gross. Also the whole grind mindset, that's great if you enjoy it but I certainly don't have that energy and when people belittle other people for being lazy or whatever, it's not even like that, I work very hard when I need to.

I want freedom, security, and comfort.

Unfortunately, you can only have one of these at a time

if it's any consolation, this bubble with burst soon and most of these types will be too distressed working an actual job to bother chasing the rat-race

Just tell him no, tell him you don't want to be on his social media.

Exactly this. And if they ask "oh but why not". You just answer "I just dont want to be on your social media". You never have to validate your reasoning for saying no.

If they push the why, then ask them if they're genuinely interested in the answer before giving one. Force them to be a part of the conversation, because why people ask "aww why not", its not because they're interested in the answer, its because they wanta yes. Just say no.

I do a lot of things for fun that I could theoretically make money from. I model and 3d print stuff, I woodwork, I make electronic projects, I'm a musician, and a software engineer.

Sometimes I'll get people saying stuff like "you could sell XYZ". I tried it. I had an Etsy store where I sold my 3d prints. It was successful. Too successful. I was working my day job and then spending most of my free time printing and sanding and painting and talking with customers and dealing with shipping.

Initially I thought how great to be able to spend all my free time doing something I enjoy. In the end i thought how dreadful it is to spend basically all of my time working.

It fucking sucked. I'm glad to have had that experience, but now I know It's actually super important to have hobbies that are just hobbies.

You didn't just raise your prices till you weren't that busy?

Several times, but there was a limit to how much I felt comfortable charging someone for 3d printed plastic

That or until you no longer need to work your other job and can ideally reduce total number of hours worked. May not work out, but at least you can balance it out somewhere like that.

As someone looking to make their own first electronic project, tips and tricks you wish you knew beforehand? Thinking of building my own music player, since the ones on the market are either overpriced or just a toy

  • A half-decent soldering iron is way better than a super cheap soldering iron.

  • Plan the build as much as you can, and then order all the parts at once. This way you're not tied up waiting for parts to ship which kills momentum.

  • Wires take up more space in an enclosure than you think.

  • If you can order 3 of something for not much more money than 1. Do it. It'll allow you to build up stock of things you use. That way when you get an idea, you'll have parts on hand.

  • Allow yourself to fail. Some ideas sound good but aren't. It's ok to abandon a project.

  • Lean on the community. If you have an idea for a project, someone's probably done it before. Look it up, see how they did it, learn from their mistakes. You can stand on the shoulders of giants and you absolutely should.

Not to discourage you but that is a super ambitious first project. If you want a good audio player but don't want to spend a ton, I have the fiio snowsky echo. It's super affordable, but surprisingly powerful. It drives my 250 ohm headphones without issue. No way you're DIY'ing anything that good for its price. However if you want to DIY a music player just because you want to, absolutely go for it!

Thanks so much! Really helpful :)

I looked at all the dap's that are out now and none do it how I envision it. I don't mind spending more than a luxury dap for it if I can say I made it myself haha

The problem isn’t TikTok or YouTube—it’s some guy at work who felt entitled to use you for his side hustle. If someone treats you like a prop instead of a person, you don’t owe them compliance, and you don’t owe bystanders an explanation either.

Yep. Nothing forces anyone to do anything, people do this crap willingly, and then blame everyone else for their poor behaviors.

It's called be a shitty human being.

Well TikTok is also extra reprehensible since it's been taken over by CIA/Oracle.

I'll answer your question and provide my valuable insights after you subscribe to my Patreon

Sometimes I get annoyed at the crowd that sees me doing something they think is cool and be like "you could sell or provide [x hobby]"

This took the joy out of everything.

“Oh you write music? You should make an album and sell it” “oh you cook? You should make a ghost kitchen/foodtruck/marketplace” “oh you do 3d printing? You should model stuff for people or make a print farm” “oh you do open source stuff? Why don’t you work in coding or at least do fiverr coding jobs?” “Oh this home server is cool you should set these up for people for money”

FUCK YOU

And then when they find out I just like, post recipes or code or models or whatever online for free because I want to contribute back to the communities that taught me a lot they’re like “you’re crazy”. Maybe I don’t want to fucking monetize everything. Maybe I’m sick of everything being monetized. Maybe I believe information should be free and this hustle culture tech bro bullshit that took over the Internet post 2006-08 or so where everything has to be paywalled or monetized is absolutely cancerous and should be destroyed.

Our greed will destroy us all

It's not just the monetisation. If you turn a hobby into a job you end up having to do a lot of stuff you don't actually want to do or care about, because the people you do it for care about these things.

Exactly. I made code for our school project open source and some of them said we could like sell this. I'm like bro, this is mostly youtube tutorial code with some modifications, who will you sell this to?

I've been a computer nerd since I was like 10. When I was younger (damn, am I that old already?), I used to install PC games for friends (including ahem cracks). I always did it for free just, well, because they were friends, and because it took no longer than 10 minutes in the worst case. Their parents always threw a few bucks my way anyway, which I always tried to refuse, but ended up taking because of their insistence.

I also started contributing to open source from a relatively young age (I think I was maybe 20), not with the intention to make a career out of that, but because I found it a fun activity, and liked my contributions helping people.

In both cases, my family was all over me for not making a career from that. Like, my brother in Christ, I don't need to be fucking working 24/7 from birth to death. People are allowed to do things just for fucking fun.

Imagine if we get a robust universal unconditional social dividend atop a properly adequate "basic income", accompanied by high quality free-to-use social services (including transport)... then we could:

ikigai

Do what we're good at, what we love doing, and what needs done, fulfilling our passion and mission, not just our profession and vocation.

this image sucks in dark mode

Thanks God I love and the world need insurance accounting. My childhood hobby of crunching excel files really paid out.

Yeah, though, don't really need the smaller portions pointed out to get the main gist. Most versions of the Ikigai venn diagram don't even include those.

So the people that work really hard fund those that don't feel like working. Seems like a great deal. For some people

We have that problem NOW.

Billionaires don't work at all, they just siphon money away from us all, our labor, our hard work, our time, they get 99% of all that profit, we get crumbs.

It's a great deal, for them, the rest of us get just enough to not die or start rioting.

Try again.

You will always have the rich & powerful and the poor. The problem is that the rich have lost all care for the poor. When you look throughout history the aristocracy was raised to rule and to steward great wealth. This meant funding art, cathedrals, public works, social services, charitable endeavors etc This raised the HDI for their surrounding community and nation. Certainly it wasn't perfect but it was something, more than what we have now.

While most billionaires are invisible to the public what's very clear with the visible is that they are loosely 'self-made' in which maybe they were rich to begin with but not remotely close to how rich they are now. This comes with a "well I earned it so I'll spend it" philosophy. Furthermore our culture has no shared sense of identity or morality anymore so the social contract is broken. Having shed all historical culture and tradition we're increasingly atomized and alien to one another. As a result America and to a lesser extent "The West" is comprised no longer of nations but instead of balkanized economic zones. It's late-stage capitalism for sure but I would argue more succintly that it is late-stage materialism. Nihilism will always be the result when you remove the soul from the social equation.

Btw, Thinking that billionaires don't even work is just silly.

No it isn't, that's the economic reality. Do you think billionaires make that much because of some outrageously high salary or hourly wage? Because that ain't it. They make their money by having money.

Having money AND taking it from all the people under them. Sorta like a pyramid. It's sort of a scheme where the top guys get most of the profit while doing the least actual work. I wish we had a term for that. An upside down funnel, of sorts.

Underregulated Capitalism like we have now is just a

Tap for spoiler

Pyramid Scheme

Work can mean a lot of things, in many ways Elon Musk could be said to work a lot. But it’s not comparable to what we mean when we normally talk of work. Musk has already amassed more wealth than he can meaningfully spend, regardless of how he uses his time. For all intents and purposes, all his time is free time. He chooses to spend it by laboriously being an asshole.

It works fine for me and most people. You just need to be dedicated and have a skill that's valuable. If you don't have one then you need to get one.

Valuable and in demand are not the same.

I never said they were, but if you're good enough at your skill you will be valuable

What job are you doing that isn't having most of the value you made taken from you?

I'm a highly skilled person, I've been in corporate America for 2 decades and have a long list of skills and abilities and work hard.

I've literally generated multiple millions of profit for companies I've been at. Did I ever see an extra penny? A bonus? A % raise? Anything beyond the normal bare-bones standard "cost of living raise" (which never ACTUALLY goes up as much as CoL does BTW) ? Nope. And that's part of the issue we are talking about. I could be a STELLAR employee and generate the lion's share of profit OR I could be a lazy unproductive idiot that costs the company money and you know what? Neither of those things changes pay for me. What does? How well liked I am, how much I brownnose, who I shake hands with, who I know, what shady deals I may do in secret, etc. But I have integrity and I refuse to lie, cheat, grift and schmooze my way up like most execs do.

It is EXTREMELY common to work your ass off, earn some CEO and shareholders millions and billions, then they can lay you off or you die and no one cares. They milked every last drop of productivity from you and will happily discard you at any time.

Dude, if you're making your company millions of dollars and they don't recognize it then that's your fault. You're obviously not playing the game right in your company.

That's exactly my point though. It's arbitrary and has nothing to do with "hard work" or "ability" as you claimed.

It certainly does but with your hard work you also need to make sure that you get recognized for it. And that's up to you

It is a great deal. For everybody.

Or would you prefer a billionaire's monopoly collapsing the economy and everybody starved and enslaved in bullshit jobs?

Sorry if that's an accidental false dichotomy. What's a middle-ground alternative you propose?

UBI tests have shown people are enabled to do more, and do not just sit around because they "don't feel like working". Most work is already unpaid (and unrecognised as work). This simply remedies that.

I prefer taxing the Uber wealthy like we did before Reagan. If you're in a bullshit job that's your fault. Especially in this day of free knowledge and education. Learn a skill.

Be careful when you let your phone automatically capitalize the word "uber." You're talking about Uber drivers when you capitalize that word.

Thanks Sherlock. The world is a better place now that you pointed that out

It’s mad annoying. You’re not even being paranoid, there have been several cases lately where these wannabe celebrities refuse to back off after being politely refused. Problem is they’re the ones filming so they harass you then just start the clip around when you start getting pissed off lol. Then somehow they all have an army of like a thousand angry men who will send you death threats irl over your ‘mistreatment’ of their favorite influencer

No one can send you death threats if you have no public non-anonymous online presence ;)

It's infuriating when you look at the online content creator landscape:

Everybody's got a course. Everybody's sponsored. Every channel pitches scams with a promo code. Even many anti-capitalist channels are pushing you to sign up for some program. It's absurd.

The flipside to it is that people still pay to have specific logos and brandings on their clothings and stuff.

At least Cody Johnston drinks the green supplement crap satirically?

Maybe ask some of your coworkers for help demonetizing, brainstorm hobbies with no payoff or audience to grift, put on a reflective HV vest or hat to screw up advertising slop commentary videos, play licensed popular music, swear and refer to drugs and ask people on camera how much they make, leave copies of Bertrand Russell's In Praise of Idleness in the break room.

Look right down the barrel of the lens and make fun of the guy. I would try to tank the video.

I dislike it too. I'm not surprised at all. I'm not the brightest but the one thing I'll lay claim to is having seen this train wreck the whole way. Our generations were raised to be hyper-individualist neoliberals. It's everyone for themselves and we're all worse off for it. We're crabs in a bucket.

I didn't have those words to conceptualize it as a kid but I saw it in the way we've been pit against each other since the beginning. It's an unsustainable model. I'm not surprised the state of the world, especially the economy today.

What I don't get is if everyone is so smart then why am I the only one that seems to be seeing it. Operative word being "seems". I know a lot of other people see it too. As evidenced by whole posts like this.

But as a collective. We're supposed to be the most educated and most open minded generations ever (in terms of breadth of knowledge, not political leaning). Yet we seem to be regressing to worse off states of being than ever. What the hell is even that about?

No, I don't buy into blaming the "boomers". They voted for what they wanted collectively. Collectively. Everyone accuses them of being selfish. If anything our generations are just as selfish. I personally think we're more.

I don't buy into blaming the top 0.01% either. They are a product of our collective obsession with money and materialism. I do blame much of the top two-digit percentages. I really don't care if you're a multi-milionaire or soon to be worlds first trillionaire. You're all running the same race. Just with different scores. A butterfly flapping its wings could have just as well re-arranged those musical chairs to put anyone at the top.

The younger generations have the voting power now. But there's always excuses designed to dodge the truth. Whatever we're upset with about the world today is our own responsibility now. The truth is it sucks because too many of us are making it suck.

it really does start young...it dawned on me recently that this was the whole point to musical chairs, and a number of other childhood "games" pushed onto us at school in bumfuck nowhere. there are so many of these shitass towns in the middle of nowhere, whose whole existence is basically just the local real estate robber barons trying to get one of their kids to "make it" so they can funnel a bunch of $ back into their fief.

and the backbone of all of it is exploiting a deliberately under-educated workforce...american capitalism is fucking disgusting.

i think the thing that pisses me off most is how long it took me to get around to the fact that everybody knows this, and just...either accepts their place or doesn't care because the system benefits them.

i'm autistic...until this realization clicked for me i was kind of running around in dismay wondering why noone seemed to care everything was collapsing...but this too is just another part of the plan, it's called "boom and bust investing/disaster capitalism"

That sounds like an awful workplace. Why is some bell end cajoling you into tiktok videos at work? Fuck that. I'd be off if I worked with twats like that.

the job is easy but dealing with the people is a miserable experience. i normally get by with earplugs and nodding and asking people to add all inquiries to my calendar. i think some people may legitimately believe im partially deaf, this is a burden i am happy to bear.

that's what living in a capitalist society looks like.

I do a lot of open source contribution on my spare time because I think it's fun and I like to contribute to software that is open and free for anyone to use. I have several friends and co-workers that think I'm stupid for not only work on projects that pays me.

I'm happy as long as I get to write code for fun and also contribute to the world. That is it's own reward.

I do open source contribution so nobody else has to solve the same problem twice. And I don't have to maintain my own fork.

Is it just me or does posting videos to try to get views FEEL even slimier than standard capitalism? I sometimes ponder starting an influencer channel and immediately find it feels grosser than it does to offer a service/product for money. Just my perception?

If it helps, theres 2 things I respect when it comes to content creators/youtubers/influencers.

  1. They are rarely if ever on camera. Futurecanoe, GrogTV, early Babish, etc.

  2. They are absolutely transparent about how they are making money and they dont try to monetise every avenue.

  1. They have actual talent or a skill at something other than sales and marketing.

Well if they dont I just dont watch them.

Very agreed! I'm not much of a video watcher myself, but I do appreciate a well composed video. As I said to another commenter, I think I was just trying to express that sense of "icky" lol

ive done a channel before (like 10 years ago) just to anonymously post things i like and after a certain point a corporation began giving me free stuff on the condition i hock their shit all the time. that lost all of the magic for me and it made none of it fun anymore.

i kinda wish i could just live a very basic life, simple food, simple place to stay, and do free shit for people all the time as my whims demand. but the world isnt structured for that.

Why would that take the fun out of it? Just tell them no.

Just like this coworker. Just tell him no. "I'm not helping you with your side hustle man, find someone else."

I hope it didn't come across as critical of content creators, I think I was just trying to share this sense of... icky lol. I believe genuine creators exist and aren't just trying to make a quick buck :)

To the second part, strongly agreed. I just wanted to enjoy simple things and not have to produce all the time

There is no product. I think thats what youre feeling is missing.

I think this might be it. The worst version of capitalism is the selling of nothing, loudly haha

The issue is basically that profit is just defined by a money transaction and that is completely unrelated to the quality of values on which it is being conveyed, pecunia non olet.

There are for sure virtuous enterprises which generates values for humans, but the large part of them deals in vicious transactions which by design only exploit humans for profit instead.

If we want progress and we want a free economic system then the coin must be one and only, and it must be directly connected with the effects on the wellbeing of each fellow human.

Did he ask you to sign a model release for being in his video? Did he offer payment for your work?

I dislike it.
I have been surprised at the coworkers with that stream their daily activities.
Seems to be a symptom of a failing economic system (i.e. too many people have access to too little money). The minimum wage needs to go up.

Not really. People are in really bad spots and need money. While I roll my eyes at grindbros and hustle culture and all this pointless/asinine tiktok influenza crap, it's pretty disingenuous to deny that people actually do need additional income outside of their main job.

That said, what you have described seems pretty annoying.

My regular job schedule is rotating 12 hour shifts. We work 3 or 4 days/nights in a row, either 0400 to 1600 or 1600 to 0400, and then get a few days off to flip sleep schedule to do it again on the opposite shift. The benefit to this schedule is that every 4th week, we're scheduled 7 days off in a row. But because of vacations and callouts, it's pretty common to have to come in on days off to cover.

We also have two times per year for about 3-8 weeks where everybody would 6 or 7 day weeks. That's 72 or 84 hours in a week. And because we're hourly, that's very good money, but because the cost of living is so high in the area most of us are commuting about an hour each way. So every 12 hour day is roughly 14 hours away from home. So those times of year are really 84 or 98 hours per week away from home, and a week only has 168 hours.

The work itself is also fairly demanding. We don't just sit at a desk. We are climbing ladders, carrying heavy shit around, shoveling, turning valves, running to respond to alarms, etc. A light day is still a day at the gym.

Despite this, there is an absurd amount of pressure to come in a significant amount more for training or you'll never get a promotion. And a lot of my coworkers seem to be happy to do that.

Idk what they're doing with their time outside of work, but it seems like they can't possibly have time for anything meaningful. I don't understand the point of chasing money that hard if you don't give yourself any time to spend it. I keep talking myself out of spending on things I want because I know I won't actually spend any time enjoying those things, so I'm just sitting on a useless pile of money and working at a place that's trying to push me into trading even more of my time for even more useless money. And nobody seems to see the problem. I'm glad that my bills are paid and everything, but how the fuck is this different from being a slave that's housed and fed?

All I do is work and sleep, and I'm expected to work even more, and I'm surrounded by people who think I'm crazy for not pulling 60+ hours every week. That sort of schedule is what somebody who hates their family does, and I happen to like my wife.

Damn. I work a pretty easy M-F 40 hour work week, but still feel like I have no free time. Your situation sounds like hell.

Maybe you find a goal to use the money for. Figure out how much you need to quit working for a while and do that goal. Maybe an extended period of traveling. Maybe just time to be unemployed for a while why you find work you enjoy.

I've had some shit jobs but yours sounds especially awful. Run the fuck away from that place. Take a pay cut if you have to.

While it‘s obvious that one income alone won‘t feed a family anymore, our culture pushed multiple-job-holding even further by normalizing several income streams and especially gig-work. A gym nearby now advertises „earn 1€ per workout“, which is effectively just a discount, but gives you the feeling of actual profit

Yes. Everything is monitored, and it sucks. We've internalized it even, you can't so much as have a hobby without dumping money into it to signal you take it seriously

there are a lot of youtubers and tiktokers that dont do it for the money

i learned how to code from a pretty young age
Every time i particupated in a game jam or made a game or any other coding related project, i was asked by my parents if i made money from it
I was like 12 years old; i hated that

Depends on who you follow, specially on YouTube. There are lots of small channels that just make videos about how they feel and how to improve yourself, for example.

I subscribe to all of those small channels with an interest that i share. Then youtube feels like when it started. Just ordinary people talking and not acting in front of camera.

I mostly watch YouTube for the guitar videos. The best guitar teachers on the planet are on YT with tons of free guitar lessons and other interesting content (gear reviews, repair videos, guitar building, etc.). A lot of them are selling some special course, but they're all offering plenty of free content, and I've never felt the need to pay for anything.

As a boomer, I learned to believe in slow, steady and hard work. Combined with saving. Get-rich-quick never works & greed is despicable.

The problem is that there aren't even ways to "get rich slow" anymore. And saving? Good fucking luck when rent alone is half your monthly income and your grocery bill has gone up 30% since the pandemic.

Yes, it’s not unlike when I was young 🤓 still: we should tax the rich. Instead of making bezos Zuckerberg et al rich, we should tax the rich.

Yes, it’s not unlike when I was young

It really, definitely is

You weren’t there, but I’m here; with kids too. I can compare, times were different back then but not better.

Buddy, you used to be able to buy a home and go on a yearly vacation on one salary from a person who did not go to college. It's not even close to the same

im an Xer so never experienced it but saw it and wow. it would be nice.

That’s relative. I had a just a few wooden toys, people were old at 55, cancer killed people, there was hardly any diagnostics and few medicines. Lgtbq people didn’t “exist”, gays were heavily discriminated against. Mobbing was fully accepted. Sure, looking back has a romantic ring to it, but I wouldn’t want to go back. Back then and today: best is to count your blessings.

jobs out of high school with pensions is a pretty big effing deal. Im wishing I die by 55 before I lose my house.

Yeah kinda. But people value different things. I value time so work less hours at work and take an easy stress free job. I could earn double if not more working elsewhere but at what cost.

If I’m housed, watered, and fed then the next thing I want is time. I love my job and still hate going to work and I work from home. I hate the idea of giving so much of myself away for Monopoly money.

This really just goes to show how strapped everyone is. If all you ever think about is needing to make more money, you’re struggling.

If my 'struggling' you mean 'i want to be wealthy but i constantly overspend'.

nobody doing social media posts is in poverty.

You're in luck, for the modest sum of 19.99 I will answer your post!

Well in this case it probably isn't money he is after, but attention and fame. That said, just tell him you had a past "incident" you don't like to talk about, but that your image shouldn't be on anything that might give away your current location. Lol.

just tell him you had a past "incident" you don't like to talk about, but that your image shouldn't be on anything that might give away your current location.

I appreciate that you are trying to help here, but I'd advise against that. This is a person who shows little respect for others' privacy or feelings. Telling them a lie like this could easily result in them trying to find out what this "past incident" was, telling other people OP has some past trauma and making them even more uncomfortable.

It should be way more simple: no means no, and you're not entitled to have other people play a part in your videos.

Well of course it should be simpler, the employer should put a stop to it without even requiring a complaint. Aside from it being the right thing to do, allowing it opens them to all sorts of liability. So obviously the employer isn't very bright. The rest was part joke, and part a way to possibly play nice and still get what she wanted. Only someone who knows him would know if it would work or make things worse. So I could have put your milage may vary, but I thought that was kind of obvious.

No. I hate the fact that the world has forced people to need to do so.

So the guy is bragging/constantly on social media, at work, about having a side hustle?

A) report that shit to your boss. I'm sure they'd be happy to find out that instead of actually doing the job they're supposed to be paid for doing, they're on their phone dicking around on social media.

B) anytime they turn the camera on you, speak your mind and don't hold back. Tell them how shit you think they are for doing this whole thing, how annoying it is for you to constantly deal with their bullshit at work, and that they're a loser for trying to include random strangers in their shit.

C) report them for harassment. Especially if you've told them to stop multiple times. Your boss would like that one, too.

Yes. And, I hate that everyone feels like they have to do this shit to pay for their lives. We cant just enjoy things anymore, it’s all monetized.

Nobody has to do it. They choose to do it, and then justify it will some bullshit excuse like they have no other option. They do have other options, they just choose not to exercise them. Often because they feel like social media, or MLM, or other shitty choices will be a shortcut to fame and riches.

And if I complain too much about being included in their grift everyone will shit on me for being a karen or for not helping him with it.

I don't think this is true at all, most people absolutely feel the same.

Probably depends on plenty of demographic factors, but I wouldn't say "most people absolutely feel the same."

You must be an influencer. I promise that most people don't want to be in your videos and hate when you come around with your phone out

It is exactly because of those wide generalizations and assumptions that I disagree in the first place. Do you know what platform you happen to be on? This isn't Instagram

...you think influencers aren't on lemmy? 🤦‍♂️

As a matter of fact, I take it very personaly. Making it near useless is one of my long-term goals, even if only localy.

I don't know any of those people fortunately

Yeah but I sympathize, the way money rules your life and how you're allowed to live it is brutal and it's only natural to dream of overcoming that through financial success.

If anyone ever tried doing that to me, I would just ruin their video. I would be like "hey yeah, this guy is actually a pedophile" or something then just ruin it. I will not be someone's object to make money from in that sense. Not unless I'm getting paid.

I would rather be doing a job I don't like because I know I'm not going to fall in love with it enough to make it my life, than to turn something I've fallen in love in doing and making it a job I'll eventually grow to hate because it is seen as a job.

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/37/c3/48/37c3486fb4ffbd0bdbd9fe29a16d02ea.jpg

Yeah. Moreso the institutions and structure but even youtubers I like it sorta disgusts me when they get into shilling for ground news or nord vpn. I think their pieces are honestly good and I try to treat it like old time tv with ad spots in the middle of shows but ugh. its sooo.... man this is a phrase that im to old for but it just fits. cringe.

Yeah I did. It makes me want to scream. Everyone just shut the fuck up.

Everything is so hollowed out that the only thing that’s really left is making money. I remember a time when people used to cringe in front of a camera doing those viral dances and stuff. But nowadays everyone is sold on the idea that as long as you keep creating content on social media you will be rewarded for your efforts. Now whether it’s by actual people interested in the things you create or old men trying to sneak a peek into a girl is another thing…

Late stage capitalism. That's it.

Funny part is, if we only bought necessities we wouldn't encourage this behavior

I guess I'm lucky almost no one I know is trying to side hustle slop their way into money. I don't think I would put up with that happily.

Yeahh some people can't chill.

Then again I believe its good to pursue something and stay busy if you have the drive.

For me its too stressful to try to make money doing fun stuff like repairing things so I just do it with my own stuff. Sometimes friends bring stuff for me to fix.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DQ940xqkh3o/

Not only are they only thinking about the bag, but they also go about it in the silliest, most shameful ways (that don't involve selling your soul like killing brown people for General Dynamics, ofc), lol. I'd just side eye them. 🤷😅

Commodity Fetishization

Not what that means

It means turning everything into a commodity - every hobby, every human act, every creative endeavor, every way of life. The commodity form is fetishized and the drive to commodify everything is what OP is railing against.

No, that is not what the commodity fetish is. This is literally first chapter of Capital. The commodity fetish refers to the appearance of relations between people as relations between things, and the way that things (commodities) appear to have person-like qualities. This is not something that happens in the mind but a real abstraction that actually occurs under the capitalist mode of production.

And what observable effect does that have on the world that isn't exactly what OP is describing?

The commodity fetish isn't about "everyone trying to make money all the time"... The commodity fetish explains the obfuscation of social relations. Not people trying to make money. People try to make money because it can be exchanged for goods and services, believe it or not.

And what observable effect does that have on the world that isn’t exactly what OP is describing?

One could say:

  • The failure of workers to identify that they are members of an entire working class, rather than employees of different workplaces
  • The appearance of political/social relations as natural and transhistorical parts of the world
  • Arguably, the course of pretty much every attempted socialist project.

The commodity fetish is central to Marx's project. This book is a good argument on the significance of the commodity fetish for Marx.

I don't understand this ridiculous anti-intellectualism. Why reference Marx if you seem to refuse to actually learn what he said?

Characteristics which had appeared mysterious because they were not explained on the basis of the relations of producers with each other were assigned to the natural essence of commodities. Just as the fetishist assigns characteristics to his fetish which do not grow out of its nature, so the bourgeois economist grasps the commodity as a sensual thing which possesses pretersensual properties.

So when OP says "fuck why are videos like this. Why can't videos just be like that" what is happening?

Is it that OP is assigning characteristics to videos that are actually expressions of the relationship between the producers and consumers of those videos, and of the distributors and the advertisers etc?

As far as I can tell, people chasing clout for money is a human relationship, one of deprevation, desperation, and manipulation. And those relationships drive behaviors which result in the characteristics of commodities, like media.

I don't know. Maybe I've misinterpreted Marx all this time. It's certainly a topic I haven't deeply wrestled with in concert with others. Happy to be corrected and learn.

Genuine question, have you read any of Capital? Not trying to be an ass, but Marx explains in the first chapter, and the book I linked is a good supplementary text too. You don't have to read all of Capital; like I said, the commodity fetish gets explained in the first chapter. (Though I highly recommend taking the time to read all of Capital; it's a great text and provides the basis of a scientific critique of capitalism and class society.)

"Fetish", in "commodity fetish" refers to the commodity appearing to have mystical properties, when in actuality it's an inanimate object. But it appears animate; it appears to be capable of magical things; and it also makes social relations between people appear as relations between things, e.g. the relation of domination between capitalist and worker appears as an exchange of commodities, a wage in exchange for labour-power. The wording of "fetish" comes from an old racist conception where Europeans said that Africans had a "fetish" of particular religious objects, i.e. they ascribed magical properties to these objects that they didn't have. Whilst that old conception is racist and wrong, I think the concept of the commodity fetish still holds true.

The commodity fetish isn't particularly related to what OP is talking about. Clout-chasing is just clout-chasing. The desire to make money is because, well, we live in a capitalist society, and more money means you can get more stuff. The commodity fetish describes properties of commodities, not behaviour of people. It describes the way commodities actually appear; there's no mental process or actions you can take to undo the commodity fetish, because it is a description of the actual way commodities function under capitalism.

Genuine question, have you read any of Capital?

Yes, but I definitely don't fully understand it. You and I disagree on the meaning of this concept, and I'm keen to learn, but if it's not too arrogant, I'd like to continue pushing my understanding and having you critique it so I can learn where my error in understanding is.

“Fetish”, in “commodity fetish” refers to the commodity appearing to have mystical properties, when in actuality it’s an inanimate object.

I always thought this was sort of a metaphorical or poetic way of describing the phenomenon. Like, what even is an example of a "mystical property" that would apply in the context of industrial modernity? I don't think Marx was critiquing the phenomenon of people believing their kitchen knives were sharp because of their connection with the divine or that automobiles were able to heal your epilepsy if you just laid your head against the engine block.

But it appears animate; it appears to be capable of magical things

Again, this seems metaphorical. My understanding is that Marx's analysis is that when individual commodities are fetishized he meant that people believe that commodities as commodities are capable of meeting the believer's personal human needs, when in reality it is actually the human relationships that are meeting the needs through the application of labor on nature to produce that which is needed.

To reiterate, I'm presenting my understanding so you can critique it and help expose my incorrect understanding.

it also makes social relations between people appear as relations between things

I understood this not to be an also but rather a restatement of the same thing referred to by the magical/mystical framing.

the relation of domination between capitalist and worker appears as an exchange of commodities, a wage in exchange for labour-power

Yes, this I see and agree with. I believe it's consistent with my understanding and does not represent a contradiction with my understanding. Although it's interesting to see it framed this way and think "was Marx saying this as individual human relations or as class relations, or both?"

Clout-chasing is just clout-chasing, The desire to make money is because, well, we live in a capitalist society, and more money means you can get more stuff

Isn't this mystical thinking? "Money means you can get more stuff" is ascribing a power to commodity (in this case money) that is actually a power inherent in the relationship between humans. Money is a perfect example of "a belief that the exchange values of goods are inherent to them" and an example of a pathway by which "social phenomena such as market value, wages and rent are reified"

Bringing it back to the video thing, content creators see what they produce as a commodity, a commodity collectively call "content". If you've spent any time at all in the world of content, you know that the way people relate to the production and management of content has "absolutely no connection with the physical nature of the commodity and the material relations arising out of this" (to quote Marx).

And the OP's post is a prime example. Communication is the fundamental reality when it comes to content. Humans communicate with each other. We've created ways to communicate across time and space. And instead of using it to communicate things that humans need or desire to communicate, content creators see content as a way to make money. As such, they subvert the original communication goals and produce lies, rage bait, or shallow attractors and then fill that content with "calls to action" to "like and subscribe" or spend their time trying to be part of other content to spread their "brand awareness" etc, etc, etc.

All of these things feel like the magical properties Marx is describing. All of these things reify the social phenomena of rent, intellectual property, advertising revenues, etc. And none of these things bear any resemblance to real human communication, which is the fundamental "what" that content actually is.

That's my argument. And I feel like it's pretty solid. But again, it's easy for me to feel that way if I have a fundamental misunderstanding of the concept. If I thought cheese was anything that contained milk, and I poured milk on spaghetti, it still wouldn't mac-n-cheese but I would be real confident it was. So, please don't take my words to be a religious argument or something I hold strongly. I'm happy to abandon my whole argument if you can help me understand what I'm missing or what I've assumed that makes my thinking erroneous.

And if you do engage with this, thanks for your time and effort in helping me develop a clearer understanding.

My understanding is that Marx’s analysis is that when individual commodities are fetishized he meant that people believe that commodities as commodities are capable of meeting the believer’s personal human needs, when in reality it is actually the human relationships that are meeting the needs through the application of labor on nature to produce that which is needed.

This is a common misunderstanding, but not correct. The commodity fetish is not something that occurs in people's minds. We could all be consciously aware of the commodity fetish but it would still happen; it doesn't describe a false belief, but it describes the actual appearance of commodities under capitalism. It falls into the category of a "real abstraction", that is, an abstraction that actually happens in real life, rather than one that is psychological. Another example of a real abstraction is abstract and concrete labour. Concrete labour is the actual labour performed, such as sewing, farming, driving, etc. Concrete labour must become abstract labour in order to exchange commodities; if I exchange cookies I baked for a T-shirt you tailored, we somehow have to make baking and tailoring commensurable, even though they are qualitatively different labour. How many cookies is a T-shirt worth? That would seem a nonsensical question at first glance, because those are two completely different things. But the value-form provides a universal quantifier of commodities, that is, socially necessary labour time, which must be a measure of abstract labour, because e.g. 1 hour of highly skilled labour is worth more than 1 hour of unskilled labour (here, "skilled" is not meant disparagingly towards unskilled labour; skilled labour is more labour because it requires education, e.g. a doctor's labour is not just 1 hour of doctoring but also 10 years of medical school split up across the doctor's whole career). Making concrete labour into abstract labour is a real abstraction, i.e. it really happens every time you exchange commodities. You can be aware of it, you can be critical of it, you can hate that it happens, but it will still happen; it is part of the exchange process. Similarly, the commodity fetish is part of the commodity form. If it were psychological, it would be divorcable from the commodity form; the exchangers of commodities could simply decide in their heads to "combat" the commodity fetish and not be beholden to it.

Marx clarifies in the section of Capital I'm talking about (the subsection of chapter 1) that the causation is not "people see objects as homogeneous labour → they exchange them", but the other way round: "people exchange products of labour → they equate different kinds of labour as human labour".

Like, what even is an example of a “mystical property” that would apply in the context of industrial modernity?

Taking directly from chapter 1 of Capital again, the commodity reflects the social characteristics of people's labour as objective characteristics of the products of labour themselves. This is a peculiar trait of commodities—in pre-capitalist societies, relations between people appeared as relations between people, but in capitalist societies, relations between people appear as relations between things. Examples Marx gives of this:

  • Equality of different kinds of labour takes on the form of equal objectivity of products of labour as values
  • Measure of labour-time takes on the form of magnitude of value of products of labour
  • Relationships between producers take on the form of social relations between the products of labour

Isn’t this mystical thinking?

Again, we're not talking about any kind of thinking. The commodity fetish occurs without awareness, i.e. it is not a process that occurs in the mind.

“Money means you can get more stuff” is ascribing a power to commodity (in this case money) that is actually a power inherent in the relationship between humans.

I mean, no, "money means you can get more stuff" is true in the context of capitalist society. I have a job not because I love doing shitty manual labour for the capitalists I work for, but because I need a roof over my head and I need to eat. I'm alienated from the means of subsistence as a proletarian so I need to sell my labour-power to obtain means of subsistence. This is objectively correct; that's how capitalism works. Being anti-capitalist or a Marx scholar or attaining any kind of consciousness is not going to change these facts.

And content is not a commodity (or it is only in the colloquial sense, not in the Marxist or economic sense). Commodities have an exchange-value. Generally, online content is not exchanged, but distributed for free (since it can be copied nearly-infinitely nearly-freely; e.g. you reading my comment doesn't prevent anyone else from reading it).

Oh wow, that was an awesome clarification. Thank you! I see now that I was greatly confused by the analogy with the European concept of a fetish in foreign cultures, that such a thing was a set of beliefs held by a people. It did not click for me that commodity fetishization is not an analog to what the European's believed foreign cultures believed about certain objects, but rather an analog to the role Europeans believed it to play in that society, specifically a material role, a causative role.

Thank you for that.

On the content front, I think there's a debate to be had, but not now. I need to process and reread with this new focus. Thanks for taking the time. I really appreciate it.

No worries, happy to help :) Yes it's a common misconception like I said. Hopefully if you reread the commodity fetishism section of Capital with that in mind (it's just one subheading under the first chapter, though of course it's relevant to the whole book) you'll see some of the points I took from that section in what Marx says.

List of ways in which this would be illegal under a sensible government:

  • affiliation with a banned for-profit privacy violation scheme known as "TikTok"
  • attempting to compromise someone's privacy by persuasion to permit the placement of their likeness on the aforementioned "TikTok" in spite of the human right to privacy
  • participating in discriminatory sexism by attempting to encourage toxic forms of distinguishing between "women" and "men"
  • prioritizing personal financial gain over human rights
  • solicitory harassment
  • attempting to recieve ad revenue from illegal forms of advertisement

Tell him that anyone over 18 who posts anything on tiktok is a PDFile & you want nothing to do on that platform. Let's see how your colleagues back him up then.

Nope. I want and love to make money. I look for every opportunity to. It not only makes my line better, but it allows me to give to charity, provide for my kids classrooms, give to others, and so on. You can't help others if you can't help yourself.

No. I dislike people saying "everyone is doing this annoying thing" when it's quite obvious that a large percent of the local and global population are not doing it.

Going on a rant is great, but you gotta be factual or it's a waste of everyone's time to listen. Have some decency, please.

I dislike fake outrage that pokes fingers at innocent turns of phrases.

Yes. I know, un-be-lievable.

Maybe this large percent of population not doing it cause it is annoying?

It's hyperbole. A well established component of human interaction, used to stimulate engagement.