Noblesse oblige and the future of Cohost

[This post and its associated comments were originally published on Cohost. The post is obviously moot now that Cohost is dead, but I think it’s still relevant as commentary on the difficulty of creating a financially-sustainable social media site that is not venture-funded. Some people accused me of trying to guilt-trip people into supporting what was in reality a commercial venture, or of ignoring the financial naïvety and frequent stumbles of the Cohost staff. However, I remain firm in my conviction that with any social media site where users are customers, not the product, they are going to have to step up and pay something.]

It’s hard out there to be a social media site. Tumblr is the latest high-profile casualty, put on life support after a failure to make it into a going concern. I haven’t used Tumblr in a while, but I read Cohost every day, and write something for it every week; it’s one of my favorite places on the Internet. I’m thus concerned that Cohost may at some point also end up on the scrap heap of failed social sites.

Based on the June 2023 financial update (the latest available at the time of writing), Cohost’s financial situation is improving, but it’s still not at the point where it can be self-sustaining without the need for additional investment. Patreon-style subscriptions are planned, from which Cohost would take a cut, and paid ads are at least a possibility.

But I’m still worried about Cohost’s future, especially with a population of users many of whom themselves seem to be financially stressed, based on the increasing number of GoFundMe posts showing up in my timeline. That’s why my thoughts turned to Andrew Carnegie.

Carnegie was a 19th-century millionaire (billionaire in present-day terms) who grew up in poverty in Scotland, emigrated to the US with his family, went to work at 12 in a textile mill, was rescued from that situation by a fellow countryman who saw talent in him, served an apprenticeship as a telegraph operator, worked for a leading railroad, became a financial speculator and made a pile of money, bought steel mills and worked to drive down the price of steel, then sold his steel company and made another pile of money. He then retired to devote himself full-time to giving away money according to his own personal philosophy, which he outlined in his essay “The Gospel of Wealth” (also included in his book The Gospel of Wealth and Other Timely Essays).

Shorn of its 19th century prose and attitudes, Carnegie’s essay can be summed up as follows:

• Capitalism is here to stay, having proved its success in raising the absolute wealth of the entire population.
• However, capitalism and the free market system by their nature increase relative wealth inequality, enabling a few people to become orders of magnitude richer than others.
• Given this inherent inequality, the wealthy have an obligation to use the vast majority of their wealth for the betterment of society, and to do so within their own lifetime.
• This task is best accomplished not by making indiscriminate donations to charitable causes, but by establishing community institutions such as libraries (Carnegie’s particular obsession), hospitals, universities, art galleries and museums, and the like.
• But such institutions should not be founded in the first place unless the communities that they serve agree to take on the responsibility of funding them once they’re established.

Carnegie’s attitude was an example of what’s sometimes referred to as noblesse oblige: that those who live in a society that has enabled them to become wealthy in turn have a responsibility to give back to that society.

The person who provided the initial funding for Cohost was—self-consciously or otherwise—acting in accordance with Carnegie’s philosophy. Yes, theirs was nominally an investment, with the investor getting ownership of the Cohost source code if ASSC can’t pay back the funds provided. But, seriously, does anyone think that that source code has any significant value divorced from the community of users it supports?

Better I think to see this anonymous benefactor as using their wealth to provide Cohost users the modern analog of a Carnegie library. We as users then collectively have an obligation to ensure that Cohost as a service receives the funding it needs to survive once the initial funding is exhausted. Fortunately, we have a vehicle ready to hand by which to do that, namely purchasing one or more Cohost Plus! subscriptions.

Of course, not every Cohost user can afford the $5 (US) a month for a subscription, but many others can. Furthermore, a few people can afford to spend $50, or even $500, as easily as others can afford to spend $5. It’s those people who can and should take on the responsibility of supporting Cohost on an ongoing basis, signing up for as many Cohost Plus! subscriptions as they can.

Some might object, “you don’t get much by buying a Cohost Plus! subscription, why would you ever buy more than one?” That risks succumbing to the logic of capitalism at its most extreme, in which a life that could be a rich tapestry of personal and social relations is reduced to an endless series of economic transactions—trading value for like value, continually vigilant in every exchange to ensure that one is not taken for a fool or (worse) a mark.

Others might object, “you’re just putting a bandage on the wounds inflicted by capitalism, under socialism Cohost wouldn’t need to beg for scraps from the rich.” Well, I don’t know about you, but I don’t see the Revolution happening any time soon. In the meantime, what’s wrong with building “socialism in one website,” according to the principle “from each according to their ability”?

The ultimate question is, do you want to keep shopping for new social media sites like you’d shop for bread or a new PC? Or is the community (or communities) you find on Cohost important enough to you that you want to help make sure the site sticks around for the long haul? As @staff noted in a previous financial update, social media sites are inherently unprofitable. So let’s stop treating them solely as businesses.

Let’s encourage those who can to go above and beyond to support the site, let’s recognize those who want to be recognized for doing so,¹ and let’s feel free to lay a guilt trip on people who use Cohost a lot, could afford to pay more, but don’t. That’s what Andrew Carnegie did back in the 19th century, and we should consider doing likewise in the 21st.

Plum (@plumpan) - 2023-11-19 15:55

Generally agree with this but 100% against showing your cohost plus status in your profile, even less so showing how many. Even if it’s optional, really really really don’t like the kinda class symbol that ends up being, even if it’s because they did a good thing. No golden eggbugs.

For better or worse I’m also of the opinion that, until we fix capitalism as a whole and while that should be a priority, if you’ve got enough money that you get to pick and choose your luxury expenses then you have some duty to try and spend it more responsibly. More money to people doing what they love and/or making the world better, less directly to awful people and big companies trying to eat the world. Yes no ethical consumption and all that, but people have used that as a hand wave enough before throwing their money directly to bad people for tiny dopamine hits that I’ve long stopped caring. Paying cohost monthly instead of say, a streaming subscription (or worse, paid youtube), is an excellent example of that.

Frank Hecker (@hecker) - 2023-11-19 17:24

Thanks for stopping by to comment!

On the Cohost Plus! status thing, I personally wouldn’t take advantage of that, but some people might and (playing devil’s advocate) why not let them if it leads to them increasing support for the site? If other people think it’s cringe then they’re welcome to dunk on the folks doing it, like people dunk on the Twitter/X paid blue checks. But (as you note) spending money to support Cohost is a lot different and more justifiable than spending it on Twitter/X or many other things one could think of.

Brett (@bck356) - 2023-11-20 11:15

Man I have super mixed feelings about this

Carnegie’s fundamental point (the wealthy should distribute their wealth downward) is obviously correct and I have no objection to that

but my objection is with people becoming that rich in the first place? Especially when luck is by far the dominant determinant for that (including Carnegie himself given your provided context). I know that’s a direct contraction with one of his core points (capitalism is here to stay) but do we really want a system where our leaders are ultimately determined by chance? It sounds like Carnegie was mostly not an asshole (well sort of, you know what they say about it being impossible to become that rich without massive exploitation and I refuse to believe he was an exception) but you can’t hardly read the news without tripping over a story about the modern hyper wealthy being assholes who barely pretend to be philanthropic

And also if wealth distribution was like, even a LITTLE bit more even, people would have far more freedom to support causes and networks they care about. Carnegie is clearly not accounting for people who barely have enough for survival

So while I do get the idea of noblesse oblige it sounds like it would be far more optimized as an anarchic, socialist system. Which maybe he wouldn’t even necessarily object to if that was suggested to him, idk, he’s dead

Frank Hecker (@hecker) - 2023-11-20 17:27

Thanks for stopping by to comment!

The comment re anarchy is interesting, because in the 19th century all US governments (Federal, state, and local) were much much smaller than they are now, and provision of public goods was pretty minimal. Carnegie’s strategy was in effect to provide the startup investment for public goods (libraries, in his case) with the understanding that governments (local governments, in the case of libraries) would then take over their funding and operation. Of course, today we’re used to governments funding those things (albeit with that funding often under threat), so a Carnegie-style strategy today would focus on public goods that are not yet provided by governments but could be. (For example, things similar to the Internet Archive, arxive.org, an authorized version of Sci-Hub, etc.)

Re assholes, Carnegie was not an exception. He was a contradictory person in many ways: valorizing “honest work” but also making money with often dubious financial speculation; radically democratic in his views, but also a fan of Social Darwinism; expressing support for workers but also letting his business associates brutally suppress a strike. It’s worth reading some of his essays just to experience a 19th-century mentality at work.

Brett (@bck356) - 2023-11-21 11:24

Actually reading this comment again I realized that government funding is provided by taxpayers (obviously). So taxes going into public services is already Carnegie-style wealth distribution, just with representatives deciding what gets funding instead of individual people. The lack of new projects has more to do with representatives deciding that they are unworthy than a lack of actual funding existing for them

I don’t really blame Americans for being so insistent on low taxes when it feels like they just get siphoned up into things that don’t help anybody

AndreL (@AndreL) - 2023-11-21 02:38

I’ve wondered about whether public broadcasting provides a model for Cohost. But public broadcasting relies heavily on a combination of government support and grant money, neither of which are readily available to Cohost. And paid ads (“underwriting”) are also important to public broadcasting, with the advantage of a locality nexus which Cohost doesn’t have.

Would changing Cohost’s legal status from worker-owned co-op (I think that’s the current structure) to a tax-exempt organization help attract grants/donations? I don’t know. I have seen people complain that Beats Time and some extra Eggbug emojji aren’t worth the cost of Plus, and maybe they’d be happier paying if Cohost were legally non-profit (which in the US isn’t quite the same thing as not-for-profit). But I imagine some people are paying for Plus because they like supporting a co-op.

Frank Hecker (@hecker) - 2023-11-21 09:23

Thanks for the comment!

Re attracting donations, currently in the US the standard deduction amount is so high that for the vast majority of people it doesn’t pay to itemize deductions, including charitable deductions. I’m actually about to stop keeping track of my charitable deductions in my tax record keeping.

Nonprofit status does mean an organization will do a basic level of public reporting, and is protected against being bought out by people not aligned with the nonprofit’s purpose. But ASSC already is fairly transparent re its finances, and as a worker co-op its owners are aligned with its stated goals and likely to remain so.

On the flip side, 501(c)(3) status in the US comes with a bunch of semi-arbitrary restrictions on how you can sell stuff and get revenue, and having seen how that works in action (as a nonprofit employee) I wouldn’t wish that on ASSC and Cohost.

AndreL (@AndreL) - 2024-04-11 14:32

This comment has been in the back of my mind, and I’m in the middle of the calculations right now… you’re right that federally it is doesn’t matter for most people, but in some high-tax states (California for me) the deduction is just high enough to make the paperwork hassle of tracking donations worthwhile.