Kinda off-topic, but I’d like to learn why that is. I’ve seen it said many times before. But as a consumer, I see cheap ingredients (which must be cheaper at wholesale) being cooked and served by underpaid employees (less than minimum wage because of tipping exemptions). Beers being marked up to 10x retail price and served by bartenders who rely on tips. Sure they have overhead of rent and utilities, but so does any other business. So why are the margins so low when the costs are low and the prices high?
If you fuel up at a locally-owned gas station, and your engine gets corroded out by the additives in the fuel, it may not be their fault. Probably a QC error in their fuel suppliers. But once that has happened, you can’t really blame the customers for pumping their gas through a filter. And it’s not really the consumer’s fault if the gas station loses money because they structured their business such that they get paid based on how many (potentially corrosive) additives end up in people’s gas tanks. Bad situation for everyone involved, but it’s not uncool for consumers to protect themselves when they’re being actively harmed by the distributors.
I understand, and agree with wanting to support creators and editors, but if the only way to offer support is to allow yourself to be attacked by an unknown third party, that isn’t really reasonable. So far Patreon-style things seem to be the only model that is generally applicable (we can buy t-shirts and concert tickets to support a band, or buy art/books directly to support an artist/writer, but that doesn’t really apply to websites often enough to keep them running.)
A la carte finally exists but it kinda sucks. You’ve already paid for Netflix, Hulu, HBO, Amazon, etc., on top of your internet provider (close to a classic cable bill in total, if not more) but the show that you want isn’t streaming - however you can buy it a la carte for $2 per episode or $20 per season, so $160 to watch an 8-season series (on top of what you’re already paying for all the content-provider services). No individual part of that is really unreasonable, yet somehow it still ends up bad.
