"Owning our own work, and being beholden to no one but our readers and colleagues — as opposed to say, investors, venture capitalists, or out-of-touch executives — feels like the future."

of note:

The 404 team DIYs as much as possible. They pay for hosting through Ghost and set up litigation insurance, for example, but everyone makes their own art for stories instead of paying for agency photos. (The reporters are also the merch models). Everyone works from home, so they don’t have an office and don’t plan on getting one anytime soon. The team communicates through a free Slack channel. Koebler mails out merchandise from his garage in Los Angeles. Every month, the team meets (virtually) to decide how much they can pay themselves. (The number changes each month, but everyone gets paid the same amount.)

  • Norgur@kbin.social
    0·
    9 months ago

    While I love that they are profitable, this sounds like a massive private investment from all involved which is not a good model as a whole

    • disablist@lemdro.idEnglish
      0·
      9 months ago

      They each put a quarter share of $1,000, per the article:

      The four cofounders each own 25% of the company, and at launch each put in $1,000 to cover initial costs.

        • BravoVictor@programming.devEnglish
          0·
          9 months ago

          Isn’t that what most small business owners go through? My brother and his wife own a business and they hustle waaaay more than I need to as an employee of a large business with all the HR, retirement etc baked in. I don’t think they went net positive for like 4-5 years.

          • GreyEyedGhost@lemmy.ca
            0·
            9 months ago

            Yeah, this sounds like most small businesses. You could do well, or not. That’s the risk you take. It isn’t for everyone, which is why a lot of people work for other people for a regular wage. They trade the chance of doing really well for (more) stability, and forgo the risk of losing their investment and having to look for a new job.

      • FarceOfWill@infosec.pub
        0·
        9 months ago

        The thing is it’s profitable because they pay themselves less than they make in income. We don’t really know how sustainable their pay is

        • festus@lemmy.caEnglish
          0·
          9 months ago

          Yeah they make the same point in their subscribers-only podcast. They did say that they earn enough to be sustainable, so it sounds like they aren’t having to dip into their savings anymore. I hope they get more than that though as everyone deserves to thrive.

    • bobs_monkey@lemm.ee
      0·
      9 months ago

      To me it sounds like a journalism co-op, how is this not a good model? Everyone contributes to getting it going, and then everyone gets an even slice of the pie. They keep their overhead minimal to keep costs down, and everyone has incentive to put out their best work. Sounds solid to me.

      • Norgur@kbin.social
        0·
        9 months ago

        Well, the line between a minimal overhead, self employed lifestyle and an abusive workplace are fuzzy in those kinds of arrangements

        • BolexForSoup@kbin.social
          0·
          9 months ago

          Scaling can bring those issues to a serious head too. Can often kill a group/company pretty quickly. Saw it in the film/video production world constantly. Partners and small production companies just collapsing like a dying star every 8-12mo where I am. Almost always fighting about money, rates, types of jobs, roles, etc. because the loose arrangement worked when it was a handful tight knit people making modest money. Collapsed when real dollars showed up and they wouldn’t stop hiring people for cheap like they were all still scraping by in the beginning.