Hacker News Reader

Comment by davidroberts | Hacker News Reader

What good is exposure if it just exposes you to more people who will want you to work for free?

If you already have something to promote, like a self-published ebook on North Korea, and they let you put a few lines and an Amazon link at the end, then it might be worth it.

Assuming: 30,000 page views, 2-5% conversion rate, $4.99 price (Amazon takes 30%, so $3.49 profit)

You could make $2095 - $5239.

I know you're just spitballing here, but 30k page views is probably pretty low and a 2-5% conversion rate is definitely extremely high.

I'm not sure what kind of traffic most Atlantic articles get. I used Gawker as a reference for guesstimating pageviews. A lot of their self-reported pageviews in the sidebar are around 30k or under.

You're right, 2-5% is high. But I do think an article that leads into a pitch for a topical e-book would convert well with Atlantic traffic.

I'm guessing 2-5% conversion rate is a little high, but your point still stands.

In this case, you might as well not have used any numbers of all. It gives an impression of concreteness in your example of numbers that are very unrealistic in my experience.

Because everyone wants to be famous, of course. Apparently.

I think the power of your comment will be lost in this noisy thread. What all of this hemming and hawing comes down to is that people are showing that they're willing to give up their creations for absolutely nothing, just to gain some sense of notariety.

We have a celebrity-obsessed culture in the US in particular, and it's becoming clear that too many people would sell their soul just to be noticed. That's the overabundant supply side. I think, at the end of the day. That's the real problem.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com