Quick take on Polymarket by Ted Gioia, who knows the biz end of show biz:
It’s getting harder to earn money in the entertainment business. But it’s getting easier to earn money gambling on the entertainment business—especially if you own the betting platform.
The same is true of all industries. At one time the stock market funneled money into businesses so they could grow or improve. Now it’s just betting, often a convoluted pile of betting on betting on betting on betting on betting, with no horse at the bottom of the pile.
BUT: This total abstraction only affects the top tier. Major US industries moved their physical parts to China, leaving only the betting parts here. US newspapers and TV networks didn’t move to China, they simply degraded their products to unwatchable unreadable trash. The result is abandoned rusting factories in both cases.
Investment still works at the small scale. Small businesses or small podcasts need money for equipment and staff.
What’s missing? There’s no mechanism that funnels SAVINGS into a small industry or a small newspaper. Small outfits have to borrow from banks or, if lucky, find a local silent partner.
What’s the answer? Reinvent an investment market using a Mutual Benefit Society structure. MBSes were a major source of investment for farms and small businesses 100 years ago.
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Next day, a longer piece by Ted Gioia makes one weak point and one strong point.
The weak point: A few big businesses control everything now. Not new! Before 1980 Sears controlled 60% of online shopping. (Phones and mail have different shapes now, but still phones and mail.) The three networks controlled most of TV, and a few studios controlled most movies.
The strong point: Before the Tech Tyrant era, patrons sponsored great art and music (and I’d add science.)
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Wealthy patrons who supported Michelangelo and Bach weren’t trying to make profits. They were in pursuit of artistic greatness. They were willing to lose money on the transaction—because their goal was eternal fame. And only magnificent works of art could deliver that.
That was still true until recently, even in the United States. Broadway shows were financed by people who typically lost a lot of money—but wanted a taste of greatness. Many indie record labels and movie projects got funded for the same reason. The people who wrote the checks loved the art form.
By comparison, Bezos and Musk and Zuckerberg are crass upstarts. They will destroy the culture just to pad their already bloated bank accounts.
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The new patrons don’t want great science either. They only pay for NON-INNOVATIVE rocket-dicks to reach Mars. It’s the biggest pissing contest in history.
Polistra's Mill 