The Maker Potluck

All these Black Friday deals I've been seeing from small makers reminded me of something Adam Wathan tweeted when Laravel Nova was released:

I remember asking myself "well, if he gave them access to his courses for free, that'd kinda compensate it, right?"

After this Black Friday craze, it clicked for me. Everyone needs money to support their family/lifestyle, but we also spend some of this money in buying products made by others (not because they're made by friends, but because we need them for our work, learning, etc.). This is how capitalism works.

But, as I said earlier, in most cases we are mostly exchanging dollars. I may purchase your course, but you may already have bought my book. So, if we assume no money is earned or lost in the process, can we just get rid of it?

Here's a crazy idea: a closed, invite-only community of creators, where you can access everyone's content in exchange for your own. And the best thing is, everyone would get more than what they're giving.

If you are interested in the idea, I've created a landing page where you can sign up. If enough makers do, we'll get to work how well this works in practice.