You (We) Are the Web - A Rant

You guys, it's getting crazy out there.

The hottest, biggest, fastest growing sites on the Web - YouTube, MySpace, Facebook, Wikipedia - have one important thing in common:

These businesses are all being built on our collective backs. The reason those sites are doing well is because of the volunteer labor of the folks who use them. If nobody contributed content to those sites, they wouldn't exist.

Each of these sites is commanding a valuation in the hundreds of millions to billions of dollars. MySpace was sold for $580M. If it was sold today, it would get more. Facebook reportedly is looking for $2B to sell. YouTube is the fastest growing site in the world. Wikipedia, though in a different category, has created the largest encyclopedia in the world, with just a handful of employees.

Yet, interestingly, none of those sites is sharing any revenue with the people who are responsible for their success - you, us, the users. Not a penny. You build it, and they keep all of the money.

Now big companies and venture capital firms are realizing that people are happy to work for these Web sites for free. Thousands of new "user generated content" sites are launching. Thousands hoping to be the next YouTube, the next MySpace - thousands hoping they can slap together a site, and have volunteers make it worth millions.

It ain't right, and it ain't sustainable. It took me a while to realize that revenue sharing is the only possible direction for RateItAll, but I'm happy to say that we are still one of the only sites on the Web to step up to the plate on this.

I am extremely conscious of the fact that RateItAll is sustained by its members. You guys create the lists, you create the reviews, you keep the lists updated, and you create the profiles. You are RateItAll.

You tell me that you don't care about the money, that it's not the reason you post on RateItAll.

That's fine, and I believe you. I don't want that to change. I want folks to keep doing what they're doing, and doing what makes them happy. But I want you to realize somewhere in the back of your mind, that I am going to do my very best to ensure that you are treated fairly by this site. That if you create something - a review, a profile, a weblist - that earns somebody money, that you will see a share.

I want RateItAll to be a place that you trust to house your opinions on anything - a safe storage place for your thoughts. I want you to know that you will earn a share of revenue that is earned off content you contribute to the RIA community, that we will give you the tools to take those opinions with you as you make your presence felt around the Web, and that you can leave us whenever you want, removing all of your stuff from our database in the process.

This is starting to sound a little preachy. Just to be clear on this, a desire to be fair is not the only reason we are sharing revenue. We are also sharing revenue because, strategically, we believe that giving folks the tools to make money from their opinions will make the pie bigger for all of us, and will inrease the overall quality of the content produced. I also think that if the history of capitalism is any guide, all user generated content sites will eventually be paying their contributors.

My hope is that by moving aggressively in the area of revenue sharing, we're going to put some pressure on the big boys. If you create a profile on MySpace, you won't see a dime of the advertising revenue associated with your pictures and thoughts. Shouldn't you? If you post a review on Amazon or Yelp or any of the other review sites, those sites will use your work to make money off it. They won't share that money with you, and furthermore, they claim a perpetual license on your work, meaning that they may not remove it from their databases - even if you ask them to.

Things are only going to change if somebody rocks the boat. Come help us rock that boat.

So just to summarize, here are the ways you can make money on RIA:

- Create a profile with a picture - 100% of the Google ad rotations
- Build a Weblist - 50% of the Google ad rotations
- Add a listing to an existing ratings list - 50% of the Google ad rotations
- Refer a friend - 10% of the Google ad rotations on their qualifying pages
- Write a review - 50% of the Google ad rotations

Join RateItAll today.