blogs and the monetization of art

05/05/2026

hello all! this may not come as a surprise but blogging is quite an interesting subject to me. people with blogs have received a lot of hate, specifically post mainstream social media like facebook and instagram. i have seen and heard so many times the classic, "do you really think anyone finds your life that interesting?" the answer is yes! i do! i think people are generally pretty interesting, and everyone has thoughts that are worth sharing. homogeny is in my opinion the death of culture. in this post, id like to explore the disdain for blogging and the fear to exist.

to me, blogging is a neat form of self expression. i wouldn't consider it my passion or anything, but writing these posts makes me reflect in a way that my typical inner monologue doesn't. its also kind of nice to just carve out this space for me to exist and share my thoughts. i enjoy the idea that other people will read this and maybe feel something or think something because of what i write. that's pretty cool. i also hate the idea of people upvoting or down voting my posts. metrics and engagement are a plague that none of us are immune to.

i feel like humans LOVE being judged. we absolutely adore it, but at the same time, we hate it. it feels good when number go up and it feels bad when number go down, which i think is the basis of why people farm engagement even when there's no monetary incentive. as a disclaimer, im not gonna pretend that im immune to it. i grew up a neglected and terminally online kid, so im kinda predisposed to craving attention, but this is something i accept and choose to work around. its kind of why i made this website. its a little bit of a test for me - can i create and put myself on the table without wanting an external reward?

speaking of external rewards, let's talk about monetizing hobbies! for context, i would like to say i am mainly speaking on North American culture, as culturally im mainly Canadian/American even though that's not my ethnicity.

i feel like there are invisible eyes everywhere, watching me to see if im on that grind. even i have the brain worm that asks me if im spending my time on something that will make me money or develop a career. this worm ruins my passions, and it's so widespread and infectious that no hobby is immune, even blogging!

while i do understand reddit probably isn't the greatest place to gauge a community, i think it's still worth mentioning r/blogging. holy crap. i went on there because while i was writing this, i got curious about people who still blog, and wow. every post there is on how to maximize engagement and clicks. how to write in a way that attracts the most traffic. how to use AI to boost your efficiency. how you need to post every day if you want a following. i fear that the brutal american rat race has killed most people's ability to enjoy the process of creating something. the cogs of the machine must keep turning and you must be part of it.

one time, i was in an uber and he asked me what i did for a living, to which i replied data entry. he was like oh are you going to school or something? and I told him no and he was astounded. he told me i should try and pivot to a higher paying job like IT and i was really confused why he was so concerned about how much money i was making. it seemed like genuine concern for me too. when i told him i did web and game development for fun it blew his mind that i wasn't trying to monetize it.

its such a sad existence feeling like you need to monetize your interests. rarely does anyone feel like they're afforded the luxury of being allowed to create art for the sake of creating, but almost everybody feels a burning desire to create, and many people snuff out the flame.

its also sad feeling like our art isn't worth sharing if people don't like it, or if it's not "good enough". a while ago i came across a post that i found quite interesting that made me think about this a bit more.

while i was looking up people covering the tune "Teen Town" which i was trying to learn, i found a video of beloved bassist flea from red hot chili peppers playing the tune and it was, well, quite a poor performance. he wasn't connected to an amp, he was playing completely off rhythm and generally he sounded quite bad. in my eyes, i see a man having fun playing a challenging bassline, and i don't really care that it's bad, it's just nice seeing someone famous be bad at something. we always see the result, but never the journey, so i very much appreciated the post. buuuuuut im not immune to ragebaiting myself, so i opened the comments!

he got so so much hate. the people bashing him were saying things like, "yup i knew it, flea was always bad", or, "yeah bro is washed." and then the people who defend him are saying, "no no it's actually good you just don't understand because you don't play bass." why can we not accept that somebody is bad at something but is having fun and wanted to share it? does this mean he's a bad bassist? does it make him cringe? should he not show himself being bad at things and further contribute to us only consuming perfection which makes us judge ourselves harder?

everyone hates themselves and projects it on to others. everyone is so scared to be themself. we're all scared of not being good enough, but humans weren't meant to be perfect. there's no such thing as talent. there's only work. and the people who are great at what they do aren't great because they were born with some intrinsic quality that makes them extraordinary, but it's all push ups. its all work, and i sincerely think that the most valuable skill anybody can have in anything is the ability to enjoy the process of learning and the ability to wave away the shame of being bad.

anyway, ill sign off here. please create, everybody, and don't let yourself or other people tell you it's not worth it! byebye! (≧∇≦)ﾉ