Game Theory For Baby Names

[Forsher]

"Too much" and "not enough" are descriptions of supply. Economics is concerned about the supply of things. Specifically, economics is concerned with improving the supply of things.

Moronic. They are also descriptions of demand. Now what?

Can the supply of names be improved without people's spending decisions? Well yeah. Spending isn't the only form of feedback. However, spending is by far the best way to quantify usefulness. Therefore, spending is by far the best way to improve the supply of names and everything else.

What is the supply of names? Who makes it? Represents it? What is it? You've managed to go 13 pages without once managing to explain this. It's a problem. IT'S A HUGE PROBLEM.

And why spending is the best way of representing usefulness to someone in the case of internet searches and baby names is also unclear and NEVER EXPLAINED.

Yet another attempt to trick me into talking about my favorite topic. And again, I saw right through your ploy. But I do give you points for tenacity.

Any moderator that dinged this thread for talking about something of material relevance to its erstwhile topic shouldn't be moderating. And yes I suspect that there are some mods that would but they shouldn't be.

[The Two Jerseys]

So we don't have to spend money to determine how useful something is?

Everyone has to spend money in order to determine how useful something is to society as a whole. Right now I already know how useful this thread is to me. What I don't know is how useful this thread is to us. In order to determine how useful this thread is to us, each and every one of us should have the opportunity to spend our money on this thread. The more money that we spend on this thread, the more useful it is to us.

I can read my own mind, but I can't read other people's minds. Spending is simply a form of communication. It transfers our information about usefulness to others. When we all transfer our usefulness information to others, then everyone becomes far better informed about the usefulness of things. As a result, everyone makes far more useful decisions, and far more progress is made in far less time.

So volunteer firemen are completely useless to society?

[The Two Jerseys]

What is the supply of names? Who makes it? Represents it? What is it? You've managed to go 13 pages without once managing to explain this. It's a problem. IT'S A HUGE PROBLEM.

I've been asking for the location of the baby name factory since page six, so don't hold your breath.

[Xerographica]

Say we come across the page "List of Things Which Have Udders". This just might be the most useful page out there for my websearch. We also get the result "Cows: The Definitive Guide". It does answer my question but it's less relevant because there is more to decipher. Also, I don't know at the metaphorical point of "purchase" which of these will be more useful. If I had to spend some money to access them, I'd probably go with the Guide because I know it will answer the question. Thus, spending money has created an inefficient result... it would guide consumers towards websites which are very likely to answer their questions and frequently shaft websites that are more likely to best answer their questions. Spending money would reduce specialisation.

Let's say we spend money after I look at the website. Why would I spend any money? To indicate that I really, really liked the website? That's already being approximated through several other measures. To indicate that this website in particular helped whereas the others didn't? Again, look at what the PageRank paper says... already being done, for free. And does my preference intensity really add extra information if it's possible that I'm not really that time fussed? And isn't it also approximated by my going to the effort of making a link to the website? Of spending more time on it? Of clicking within that website? Of not clicking on further sites? What benefit do I, as an individual, get from spending the money? What extra benefit comes to everyone else? Or, in other words, in an effective "spending" case, the outcome is the same.

You have not shown us what difference comes from using money. You have not shown how it might work. You have not shown what kind of market there is.

Dollars have to be divided. Resources have to be divided. How people divide their dollars reflects how they want resources to be divided. As a result, resources are optimally divided.

Votes do not have to be divided. Resources have to be divided. How people cast their votes does not reflect how they want resources to be divided. As a result, resources are suboptimally divided.

Here are 10 songs that I like...

Hello Seahorse! - La Flotadera
Rone - Down for the Cause
DATA - Don't Sing
Jan Blomqvist - More
Kid Simius - The Flute Song
Blonde Redhead - Tons Confession
Moderat - Running
Bomb the Bass & Lali Puna - Recut
Jamie xx - Gosh
Weekend Wolves - You

Each link is to a page. Google counts the link as a vote for the page.

Do I have to divide my votes between these pages? No, I do not. But does society's attention have to be divided between these pages? Yes. It does.

Society's attention is a resource. All resources have to be divided. The way that Google currently divides society's attention is by counting how many links have been made to a page. Admittedly, its algorithm is more sophisticated than this. But in no case can Google's algorithm read my mind. Google has no idea just how useful each of these 10 songs truly is to me.

In order to reveal how useful these 10 songs are to me, I'd have to divide my dollars between them. This would be really hard. It would be cognitively demanding. But this is exactly why spending is far more informative than voting. People have to put far more thought into spending than voting. This is why the results/rankings of spending are far more thoughtful than the results/rankings of voting.

So let's say that I have $10 dollars to divide between these 10 songs. How I divide the dollars between the songs will reflect how my love is divided between them...

division of dollars = division of love

dollar division = love divison

My dollar division will communicate how I want society's attention to be divided between the songs...

$4: Blonde Redhead - Tons Confession
$2: Jamie xx - Gosh
$1: Weekend Wolves - You
$1: Hello Seahorse! - La Flotadera
$1: Kid Simius - The Flute Song
$1: Rone - Down for the Cause
$0: Jan Blomqvist - More
$0: DATA - Don't Sing
$0: Moderat - Running
$0: Bomb the Bass & Lali Puna - Recut

This was really hard. I had to make tough decisions. I had to throw some songs that I like under the bus. It's called ruthless prioritization. It's the only way that society's limited resources can be put to their most valuable uses.

Now imagine everybody doing the same thing with all the videos on Youtube. Which video would be at the very top of the list? Out of the gazillions of videos on Youtube... which video is the most useful one? Nobody knows. This is the stupidest thing. Nothing is more stupid than this. Our ignorance of social importance is by far the most stupid thing ever.

[Xerographica]

Everyone has to spend money in order to determine how useful something is to society as a whole. Right now I already know how useful this thread is to me. What I don't know is how useful this thread is to us. In order to determine how useful this thread is to us, each and every one of us should have the opportunity to spend our money on this thread. The more money that we spend on this thread, the more useful it is to us.

I can read my own mind, but I can't read other people's minds. Spending is simply a form of communication. It transfers our information about usefulness to others. When we all transfer our usefulness information to others, then everyone becomes far better informed about the usefulness of things. As a result, everyone makes far more useful decisions, and far more progress is made in far less time.

So volunteer firemen are completely useless to society?

Firemen perform a public service. A public service is a public good... yadda yadda yadda... I don't want this thread locked.

[Xerographica]

What is the supply of names? Who makes it? Represents it? What is it? You've managed to go 13 pages without once managing to explain this. It's a problem. IT'S A HUGE PROBLEM.

I've been asking for the location of the baby name factory since page six, so don't hold your breath.

I already said that the factory is in everybody's head.

[The Two Jerseys]

So volunteer firemen are completely useless to society?

Firemen perform a public service. A public service is a public good... yadda yadda yadda... I don't want this thread locked.

So spending doesn't really determine usefulness then?

I've been asking for the location of the baby name factory since page six, so don't hold your breath.

I already said that the factory is in everybody's head.

Interesting how you respond to my comment but not Forsher's comment (actually, it isn't really interesting, because we all know why you didn't), but it needs to be answered so I'll repeat it:

What is the supply of names? Who makes it? Represents it? What is it? You've managed to go 13 pages without once managing to explain this. It's a problem. IT'S A HUGE PROBLEM.

[Xerographica]

Firemen perform a public service. A public service is a public good... yadda yadda yadda... I don't want this thread locked.

So spending doesn't really determine usefulness then?

Spending is a form of communication. It provides information about usefulness.

I already said that the factory is in everybody's head.

Interesting how you respond to my comment but not Forsher's comment (actually, it isn't really interesting, because we all know why you didn't), but it needs to be answered so I'll repeat it:

What is the supply of names? Who makes it? Represents it? What is it? You've managed to go 13 pages without once managing to explain this. It's a problem. IT'S A HUGE PROBLEM.

What's the context? Are you asking in general where names come from? Because I already said that names come from people's heads. Are you asking in terms of a baby naming market website? Are you asking for the logistics of how such a website would work?

[Galloism]

Votes do not have to be divided. Resources have to be divided.

Incidentally, this isn't true. Votes do have to be divided. In the last election, you could not vote for both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. This is because you have a finite supply of votes for president per election (namely, one). The fact that some people didn't use their vote optimally (looking at you, Jill Stein voters) doesn't change the result that, from each person's perspective, there's an optimal usage of their limited supply of votes.

This is not unlike using your dollars. Sometimes we all buy something that turns out to be crap. Happens to the best of us. That was not an optimal use of our dollars, even though we thought it was at the time.

Votes are a form of artificial scarcity - not unlike things like software or video games. Yeah we can make as many copies as we want basically for free, but we artificially limit supply. Voting is roughly analogous.

Given your premise - that votes do not have to be divided - was false, your conclusion therefore is also false.

[Forsher]

Dollars have to be divided. Resources have to be divided. How people divide their dollars reflects how they want resources to be divided. As a result, resources are optimally divided.

Votes do not have to be divided. Resources have to be divided. How people cast their votes does not reflect how they want resources to be divided. As a result, resources are suboptimally divided.

Why do you think contrived exercises are able to show truths about the real world? Have you been drinking the Literature Studies KoolAid?

How are you adding this money to Youtube videos. Are we asked to pay some money at the end of every video? Do we browse a page and then have to say how much it was worth to us? Or do we frontload the payment and have to pay to view? These were fundamental questions twice over. You remained silent twice.

Let's think about those songs of yours... they all have "view counts". And we've established the thing that matters online is attention. Youtube also counts the view completion rate of videos... how much of the video is actually watched/listened to. My much greater preference for, say, "Message in a Bottle" over, say, the engineering revue's cover of Greenlight is thus reflected in the number of times I have (a) listened to that video and (b) let it play to the end. I don't even like the Revue's cover all that much... it's one of those songs which is infinitely improved by the visual cues (makes sense: it's a parody... also I am very familiar with the locations). And my distaste for Lorde's version of "Greenlight" (the original one no less) is likewise reflected in having started that video once and abandoned it pretty quickly. I have never, in fact, heard the full thing.

Now, notice the difference in the view counts? Apparently I'm a bit weird... Message in a Bottle is on 37 million views, the Revue's managed a measly 3000 or so (quite a lot from me) and Lorde's rocking 101 million or something like that.

Let's think about three more Police songs that I've listened to less than Message in a Bottle, i.e. "King of Pain" and "Invisible Sun" (which I probably like more than Message in a Bottle) and their best known song "Every Breath You Take". Youtube knows I don't like that last one as much and so doesn't include it in the sidebar when I open Invisible Sun but in an incognito window it does... because for the generic user it makes sense to do this. Damn. Without my spending money, Youtube has managed to appropriately tailor the sidebar. In fact, it even gave me the idea to listen to "Trampled Under Foot"... a very different song. Youtube is able to reflect my utility/preferences by modelling me. So, the question is: does my spending money help Youtube do that in a way that's better for me? I don't think so... as I have explained previously.

I'm not unique. Youtube (and Google as a whole) doesn't model me only: it models everyone. In fact, it's an abstract subject that creates a fair amount of anxiety... and has for some time.* Modelling everyone provides better results for individuals. As I pointed out, I search "country simulator" and I get NS at the top of the list... I do that in DuckDuckGo and NS is the second ranked site. Which begs the question of why use DuckDuckGo, right? Well, see the footnote. I guess it's probably time to start talking about externalities.

Throughout this thread, Xero, you've occasionally brought up ideas like "social importance" which naturally involve externalities. Yesterday my neighbour annoyed me enough with the crap they were blasting that I walked out the door and asked them to turn it down. I'm not sure what would have happened if they hadn't been by their gate when I got there. Would've been a bit weird knocking on the door, I think. Their taste in "music" provokes disutilities for pretty much everyone who doesn't like that music... some genres provoke essentially binary reactions of "fan" or "anti-fan" with very few people who are meh to the genre. But we can assume that my neighbour would have spent a fair amount of money on the music in our exercise above. And, in theory, I could spend money on everything I do like or similarly in an "anti-ranking" but doing so either wastes my time or forces me to engage with more disutility in finding out what the crap is. That's not a good system. Xero, you want us to use private valuations to determine social optima. Xero, EVERYONE ALREADY KNOWS THAT DOESN'T WORK.

The way things already work means Youtube is never going to recommend, um, Friday to me, but it will recommend Friday to people who it actually likes. In essence, the demand for videos is disaggregated by Youtube... through modelling individuals it is able to have a "market" for every individual. So, bring on the private valuations, right? Well, maybe it matters more that I listen to Message in a Bottle more than Invisible Sun. I do like the latter more as a piece of music but, in general, I'm not in the mood for lyrics like this:

I don't want to spend the rest of my life
Looking at the barrel of an Armalite

And that's coming from me... someone who measures lyrical worth as much as by their sound/feel as what it is that they say (which is one reason I loathe my neighbour's music... the words get in the way of the music). Don't you usually say that what we do matters more than what we say? Well... Xero, there are multiple kinds of doing, and some of them are a lot less influenced by this meme than others. Which is why spending money doesn't really add anything to the existing system.

As to how spending helps when we want to know the generalised case? How would it work? We do actually need to know that, Xero.

*It's interesting. Governments care if I am unemployed, sick or going to commit a crime. Companies care about how I spend my money. Somehow it's the former group I have to worry about??

[Bombadil]

Now imagine everybody doing the same thing with all the videos on Youtube. Which video would be at the very top of the list? Out of the gazillions of videos on Youtube... which video is the most useful one? Nobody knows. This is the stupidest thing. Nothing is more stupid than this. Our ignorance of social importance is by far the most stupid thing ever.

To who.. and for what.. each list would denote the value to the individual alone - the value of my choice of music is of absolutely no use to anyone else. It is the most useless information out there, what use could be made of knowing my choice of music? I guess Youtube can by suggesting similar songs for me, there's a purpose for Youtube but that's it, their only purpose is to make money - if you feel the only value in this world is to make money then fine, but the sole purpose is not simply to understand the 'value'.

Even if we collectivise, I can hardly imagine any single video would be at the top of the list for more than 5% of the population, thus 95% didn't choose it. Still, what is the value and purpose of such a list. None at all.

What is the purpose of putting a monetary value to baby names. None at all. If there was you can bet someone would be doing it.

[Forsher]

What's the context? Are you asking in general where names come from? Because I already said that names come from people's heads. Are you asking in terms of a baby naming market website? Are you asking for the logistics of how such a website would work?

Identify all the actors in your thread's premise, Xero. Demonstrate that there is such a thing as a market for baby names. Who'd participate in your thread's idea, Xero? What's your "game" modelling? What incentives do these actors act on?

All of these things need to be done.

[Xerographica]

Votes do not have to be divided. Resources have to be divided.

Incidentally, this isn't true. Votes do have to be divided. In the last election, you could not vote for both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. This is because you have a finite supply of votes for president per election (namely, one). The fact that some people didn't use their vote optimally (looking at you, Jill Stein voters) doesn't change the result that, from each person's perspective, there's an optimal usage of their limited supply of votes.

This is not unlike using your dollars. Sometimes we all buy something that turns out to be crap. Happens to the best of us. That was not an optimal use of our dollars, even though we thought it was at the time.

Votes are a form of artificial scarcity - not unlike things like software or video games. Yeah we can make as many copies as we want basically for free, but we artificially limit supply. Voting is roughly analogous.

Given your premise - that votes do not have to be divided - was false, your conclusion therefore is also false.

You can't divide one vote. You can, however, divide one dollar. You can also divide 10 pennies. But you can't divide one penny.

Now if each voter could divide 10 votes among all the political candidates then this would count as votes being dividable.

[The Two Jerseys]

So spending doesn't really determine usefulness then?

Spending is a form of communication. It provides information about usefulness.

Except it doesn't.

I need a car because my old one died. I decided that I want to buy a specific model. I don't want an engine with the start-stop feature, and I don't want touchscreen radio controls. The car comes in two trim levels: one has an engine with start-stop and a radio with knobs, the other has an engine without start-stop and a radio with touchscreen controls.

How is my buying either trim level communicating the usefulness of any of those features to the manufacturer?

Interesting how you respond to my comment but not Forsher's comment (actually, it isn't really interesting, because we all know why you didn't), but it needs to be answered so I'll repeat it:

What is the supply of names? Who makes it? Represents it? What is it? You've managed to go 13 pages without once managing to explain this. It's a problem. IT'S A HUGE PROBLEM.

What's the context? Are you asking in general where names come from? Because I already said that names come from people's heads. Are you asking in terms of a baby naming market website? Are you asking for the logistics of how such a website would work?

You're the one reinventing the wheel for no good reason, explaining it is your problem, not mine.

[The Two Jerseys]

But you can't divide one penny.

I do it all the time.

[Maqo]

Xero, are you aware that other methods of voting exist?

First Past the Post (most votes wins) is the simplest voting method, but also the worst.
There are other methods like (instant) run-off, approval, Schulze...

[Xerographica]

Now imagine everybody doing the same thing with all the videos on Youtube. Which video would be at the very top of the list? Out of the gazillions of videos on Youtube... which video is the most useful one? Nobody knows. This is the stupidest thing. Nothing is more stupid than this. Our ignorance of social importance is by far the most stupid thing ever.

To who.. and for what.. each list would denote the value to the individual alone - the value of my choice of music is of absolutely no use to anyone else. It is the most useless information out there, what use could be made of knowing my choice of music? I guess Youtube can by suggesting similar songs for me, there's a purpose for Youtube but that's it, their only purpose is to make money - if you feel the only value in this world is to make money then fine, but the sole purpose is not simply to understand the 'value'.

Even if we collectivise, I can hardly imagine any single video would be at the top of the list for more than 5% of the population, thus 95% didn't choose it. Still, what is the value and purpose of such a list. None at all.

What is the purpose of putting a monetary value to baby names. None at all. If there was you can bet someone would be doing it.

You're missing the point of dollar division. The point of dollar division is to determine resource division.

When you go to the grocery store you decide how you divide your dollars among all the products. How you divide your dollars between vegetables and meat reflects how you want land and other resources to be divided between them.

Apply this same logic to Youtube. You would decide how you divide your dollars among all the videos. How you divided your dollars between science videos and philosophy videos would reflect how you wanted labor and other resources to be divided between them.

Producers are supposed to serve consumers. Of course producers aren't mind-readers. This means that consumers must communicate their needs to producers. The way that consumers do this is by spending their money. Consumers decide how to divide their dollars among all the products. This lets producers know how they can best serve consumers.

[Xerographica]

Xero, are you aware that other methods of voting exist?

First Past the Post (most votes wins) is the simplest voting method, but also the worst.
There are other methods like (instant) run-off, approval, Schulze...

Didn't we discuss quadratic voting in the past?

[Bombadil]

To who.. and for what.. each list would denote the value to the individual alone - the value of my choice of music is of absolutely no use to anyone else. It is the most useless information out there, what use could be made of knowing my choice of music? I guess Youtube can by suggesting similar songs for me, there's a purpose for Youtube but that's it, their only purpose is to make money - if you feel the only value in this world is to make money then fine, but the sole purpose is not simply to understand the 'value'.

Even if we collectivise, I can hardly imagine any single video would be at the top of the list for more than 5% of the population, thus 95% didn't choose it. Still, what is the value and purpose of such a list. None at all.

What is the purpose of putting a monetary value to baby names. None at all. If there was you can bet someone would be doing it.

You're missing the point of dollar division. The point of dollar division is to determine resource division.

When you go to the grocery store you decide how you divide your dollars among all the products. How you divide your dollars between vegetables and meat reflects how you want land and other resources to be divided between them.

Apply this same logic to Youtube. You would decide how you divide your dollars among all the videos. How you divided your dollars between science videos and philosophy videos would reflect how you wanted labor and other resources to be divided between them.

Producers are supposed to serve consumers. Of course producers aren't mind-readers. This means that consumers must communicate their needs to producers. The way that consumers do this is by spending their money. Consumers decide how to divide their dollars among all the products. This lets producers know how they can best serve consumers.

When it comes to music and etc., I really don't think the greatest music came from thinking about what the audience wanted. It was created as to what the producer wanted. Do you think Kurt Cobain* thought 'hmm I'll create this style of music because in researching audience wants it's of most value'. No, it was of most value to him.

The music I like is of value to me primarily, and then by consequence of value to the producer given I pay for it. There is no real value in having a list.. that is a regression to the mean value as opposed to the most value. Your philosophy creates the blandest world imaginable.

*I'm not saying Kurt Cobain is the greatest musician out there, just using an example.

[Xerographica]

Spending is a form of communication. It provides information about usefulness.

Except it doesn't.

I need a car because my old one died. I decided that I want to buy a specific model. I don't want an engine with the start-stop feature, and I don't want touchscreen radio controls. The car comes in two trim levels: one has an engine with start-stop and a radio with knobs, the other has an engine without start-stop and a radio with touchscreen controls.

How is my buying either trim level communicating the usefulness of any of those features to the manufacturer?

It's hard for me to say exactly what the optimum level of spending specificity truly is. It's easier to say what it truly isn't. Take Netflix for example. The current level of spending specificity is suboptimal. Subscribers should be able to spend their subscription dollars more specifically. But exactly how specifically? I'm not sure. But they should certainly be able to spend more specifically than they currently can.

What's the context? Are you asking in general where names come from? Because I already said that names come from people's heads. Are you asking in terms of a baby naming market website? Are you asking for the logistics of how such a website would work?

You're the one reinventing the wheel for no good reason, explaining it is your problem, not mine.

I'm happy to explain things. But it helps when you clearly specify exactly what you want me to explain. I'm not a mind-reader.

[The Two Jerseys]

Producers are supposed to serve consumers. Of course producers aren't mind-readers. This means that consumers must communicate their needs to producers. The way that consumers do this is by spending their money. Consumers decide how to divide their dollars among all the products. This lets producers know how they can best serve consumers.

Yet despite the public throwing money at them, Elvis Presley and John Lennon haven't released new material in ages, and Led Zeppelin still isn't on a reunion tour.

[Xerographica]

You're missing the point of dollar division. The point of dollar division is to determine resource division.

When you go to the grocery store you decide how you divide your dollars among all the products. How you divide your dollars between vegetables and meat reflects how you want land and other resources to be divided between them.

Apply this same logic to Youtube. You would decide how you divide your dollars among all the videos. How you divided your dollars between science videos and philosophy videos would reflect how you wanted labor and other resources to be divided between them.

Producers are supposed to serve consumers. Of course producers aren't mind-readers. This means that consumers must communicate their needs to producers. The way that consumers do this is by spending their money. Consumers decide how to divide their dollars among all the products. This lets producers know how they can best serve consumers.

When it comes to music and etc., I really don't think the greatest music came from thinking about what the audience wanted. It was created as to what the producer wanted. Do you think Kurt Cobain* thought 'hmm I'll create this style of music because in researching audience wants it's of most value'. No, it was of most value to him.

The music I like is of value to me primarily, and then by consequence of value to the producer given I pay for it. There is no real value in having a list.. that is a regression to the mean value as opposed to the most value. Your philosophy creates the blandest world imaginable.

*I'm not saying Kurt Cobain is the greatest musician out there, just using an example.

Let's say that Youtube facilitated spending. Imagine all the money spent on music. It would be a very big money pie. What if 80% of this pie was allocated to classical music? Musicians wouldn't all be forced to make classical music. But they would certainly have a big incentive to do so.

I created this thread because it's what I wanted. But it's not like we can see the demand for topics. What if we could? Logically some thread producers would respond to it. Because that's how markets work.

[The Two Jerseys]

Except it doesn't.

I need a car because my old one died. I decided that I want to buy a specific model. I don't want an engine with the start-stop feature, and I don't want touchscreen radio controls. The car comes in two trim levels: one has an engine with start-stop and a radio with knobs, the other has an engine without start-stop and a radio with touchscreen controls.

How is my buying either trim level communicating the usefulness of any of those features to the manufacturer?

It's hard for me to say exactly what the optimum level of spending specificity truly is. It's easier to say what it truly isn't. Take Netflix for example. The current level of spending specificity is suboptimal. Subscribers should be able to spend their subscription dollars more specifically. But exactly how specifically? I'm not sure. But they should certainly be able to spend more specifically than they currently can.

You're the one reinventing the wheel for no good reason, explaining it is your problem, not mine.

I'm happy to explain things.

Seeing as how you didn't explain how buying a car with features that I don't want communicates the usefulness of those features to the manufacturer, clearly you aren't.

But it helps when you clearly specify exactly what you want me to explain. I'm not a mind-reader.

You mean it helps when I repeat the same questions I've been asking multiple times because I can never get a satisfactory answer?

[Xerographica]

Producers are supposed to serve consumers. Of course producers aren't mind-readers. This means that consumers must communicate their needs to producers. The way that consumers do this is by spending their money. Consumers decide how to divide their dollars among all the products. This lets producers know how they can best serve consumers.

Yet despite the public throwing money at them, Elvis Presley and John Lennon haven't released new material in ages, and Led Zeppelin still isn't on a reunion tour.

If Youtubers could divide their dollars among the videos... would Elvis be higher ranked than Beyonce? Who has more money... Elvis fans or Beyonce fans?

[Bombadil]

Let's say that Youtube facilitated spending. Imagine all the money spent on music. It would be a very big money pie. What if 80% of this pie was allocated to classical music? Musicians wouldn't all be forced to make classical music. But they would certainly have a big incentive to do so.

I created this thread because it's what I wanted. But it's not like we can see the demand for topics. What if we could? Logically some thread producers would respond to it. Because that's how markets work.

Instead of having a great variety of threads we'd have endless iterations of threads on religion. The greatest means of progress is randomness not order. In fact the history of the world is the battle of randomness overcoming order, progression over statism.

Fundamental laws of physics are built on this, unpredictability creating change.