"Give Increase" or Earn Profit?
OCTOBER 29TH, 2025
Editor’s Note: This discussion (published 29 Oct 2025) was ported over into DFOS via the Studio Slowcore Substack, which was itself an extension of our former Farcaster group chat, so it will already be familiar to some folks here.
It's from the Return On Attention Roundtable (ROAR) conversation series, which "...features earnest deep dives on how structural factors — social, cultural, and economic — influence the ways artists are (and aren’t) paid."
From the Substack post: "The standard ways of monetizing creative work extract gift value, convert it into profit, and route the lion’s share of it away from artists."
Since these ideas often get mentioned in our discussions of slowcore value flow, we decided to import the whole convo into our Dark Forest for easy reference, right alongside The Crumpled-$5-Bill-Problem for Artists. We also pulled in the additional discussion that happened in the Substack comments.
Subtitle: Markets extract value created by the gift and turn it into private profit. For artists to thrive, we think markets will need to stay in their lane.
Mike:
imagine if you and I had a polymarket bet on whether I would do something tomorrow
what do you think are the odds of me winning that bet?
this is what asymmetry of information looks like
now imagine I give people “shares” in this market - some get the ‘yes’ shares and some ‘no’ shares
these shares are “free” so you’re not losing anything either way, but you might win something. do these shares align our interests? No. I just bought attention for my sure bet in exchange for a few crumbs.
these are the kinds of “markets” we’re creating today in our quest to replace web2’s attention-based “Creator Economy” with a web3 speculative version of a “Creator Economy” (which is also attention based, but maybe has fewer ads)
we can keep “innovating” in that direction, but none of these “experiments” are likely to benefit actual creators
it would benefit creators who are good at speculating... and non-creators who are good at speculating
come to think of it, the “creator” part of it is completely superfluous
it’s speculation coupled with virtue signaling
so no, that’s not how we put creators first, and it’s hardly an improvement over the centralized platforms that extract value from creators
just because we have speculative instruments doesn’t mean that the solution to every problem is “more speculation!”
it’s time to put creators first, and design systems from first principles to benefit creators
Trigs:
Speculation and the gift economy?
I think this is a great little story-problem to address the issue of speculative markets in terms of gift-based economies.
Can you give gifts when there’s a speculative opportunity for reward?
I don’t know, but I really like how @abundance is framing this to draw attention to how adding a speculative loop to the core function of value exchange does not inherently align interests. Is it possible to have interests aligned around a speculative value proposition? Probably.
But when it comes to supporting content creators, speculation and extraction are exactly the opposite of the goal:
Supporting creators.
Nothing about speculation is inherently supportive or motivating for creators. Speculation motivates and supports people who enjoy gambling, and in blockchain specifically trading. Traders love speculation!
Why? Because they have outsized opportunities to extract value from speculative assets.
And that’s why it is inherently in opposition to the goal of supporting creators, because if traders have outsized exposure to upside, it means creators have outsized exposure to loss of value unless they become traders.
Maybe a hot take, but I think the majority of people will never become traders and never want to be.
Speculation needs to live in secondary markets where the core value being created is at least somewhat protected from the volatility to ensure creators are properly incentivized to continue creating quality content and not sniped into gaming the speculation.
Mike:
just to point out that speculation plays an important part in markets; it’s the other side of hedging
one party wants to minimize risk and is willing to pay a premium for that. the other party is speculating — taking on risk in exchange for the premium
this is taken to an extreme in casinos, where the house takes a premium while speculators produce no tangible value other than their own entertainment (and potential reward, which on average of course is a loss)
applying this system to rewarding creators is a bit of a misdirection: you’re still playing a casino game. you’re still doing it for your own entertainment. the casino (platform) still takes its premium, but now the creator also gets some crumbs (and you get to virtue signal that you’re not “just” playing a casino game)
Trigs:
Yes, well said. Very important to call this out with prejudice.
The virtue signaling is so dangerous because people’s expectations get out of control when they think it’s something that it’s not.
And don’t get me wrong, I’m all for speculation and markets. I just think they need to stay in their lane.
Not everything works better as a speculative marketplace.
Mike:
💯 we need markets (and we need to build better markets!)
speculation has an important role to play in markets, but it has to be secondary to value creation
Danica:
Well said, both of you.
In general I think gift economies should be considered as a complement to market economies, not an “alternative” to them.
Speculation and markets have their place. But I agree with you both: actual value creation comes first, and markets “need to stay in their lane” (love that phrasing) rather than extracting most of the value created by the gift and turning it into private profit.
Trigs:
“rather than extracting most of the value created by the gift and turning it into private profit”
Such a crucial part to get right! I think this is exactly where the struggle is. I think this is why I’m so nerd-sniped by the concept of a gift “increasing in value when it’s given.” Not invested. Not speculated on. Given.
Investments and speculation can also have this ‘increasing’ effect, but when talking about the context of creator-content and funding things that aren’t so easily quantified into a token... this is where the giving part becomes so crucial in order to get that exponential value creation effect.
Invest in a creator: now the creator is beholden to your investment and obligated to pursue a return vs pursuing their creativity. Stunted.
Speculate on a creator: now the creator is incentivized to prioritize pumping the speculative behavior so that they can extract value to pay their bills. Rugged.
Give freely to a creator: NOW suddenly the creator has their bills paid, and they are untethered and free to explore their creativity. This is when value can be created!
Once value is actually being created, suddenly there becomes market potential for people to invest and speculate, because there’s something real to invest in and speculate on.
Gift-giving is the necessary precursor to market activity when it comes to creative content. Without it, the market will always be dominated by mass-produced, low-quality content that feeds the lowest common denominator: short-term attention.
Danica:
That’s beautifully written and right on target, Trigs. I bookmarked it. Maybe turn that into a blog post or something...?
I agree about what a nerd-snipe it is to think about the implications of the gift as “giving increase” rather than “earning profit.”
Quoting from the gift economics channel FAQ:
“Our thesis is that economic models to sustain long-term creative work and community-building begin (but do not end) with gift culture.”
“The standard ways of monetizing creative work extract gift value, convert it into profit, and route the lion’s share of it away from creative people. We want to go in the other direction: restore and preserve gift value flows, return more value to those who actually create it, and convert profit into gift.”
“It’s a challenging systems design problem! But if there’s anywhere it can be done, it’s on Farcaster.”
Actually, on second thought... maybe it’s worth turning this entire convo into a blog post! After all, much of its value (gift value) is in the context.
Tom:
Trigs hit at the heart of the matter here: "Can you give gifts when there’s a speculative opportunity for reward?"
The answer is no. Gifts should not be given with strings attached. They must be given freely, with no expectation for anything in return (otherwise it's not a gift). When you add speculation, "investing" and so on into the equation, it is no longer a gift. There is an expectation that you will receive something at a future date.
Danica:
Great discussion. I agree that something given with a speculative expectation of future opportunities for rewards would not qualify as a gift.
I also think it's helpful to make a subtle but important distinction between giving "freely" and giving "with no expectation for anything in return."
The latter is charity, which isn't the same as gifting.
In gift culture contexts, things can and should be given freely, but they are not given "for free" (i.e., with no further reciprocal obligation to a group or community). The concept of giving or receiving things "for free" is still part of market logic.
Gift culture at its best works more like a "secret third thing" that relies on mutual expectations of reciprocity within specific contexts.
When something is given "for free" outside of a continued mutual obligation of reciprocity and responsibility to a community, I wouldn't call it a gift. I'd call it charity.
Tom:
Thanks for articulating these subtle distinctions, Danica. I'm interested in how you differentiate between "giving freely" and "giving for free." My personal approach to gifting is to completely remove any obligation, but that's because I have personal experience with "gifting" as a form of social manipulation.
I'm curious how you see gift culture accounting for risks like power dynamics and coercion. Especially if mutual obligations are unclear.
I also notice that we have all these cultural terms circling this concept: charity, gifts, grants, fellowships, patronage, tipping, crowdfunding. They all imply material support but carry specific connotations around pride, worth, validation, power, etc.
Danica:
You're asking questions that make me want to write entire essays on these topics! Thank you. Love it.
I'll be publishing more of my writings about the paradoxes and complexities of gift culture as we flesh out this new publication over time, and I'll have plenty to say about coercion and power dynamics.
I see Trigs has already touched on some of the tensions to be navigated here, but for starters: my understanding of this framing of "giving freely" vs. "giving for free" has been most recently shaped by an excellent piece by Kazu Haga called "Free: Brought To You By Capitalism." It doesn't address coercive or manipulative behavior directly, but it addresses a widespread and tenacious misunderstanding about gift culture. Highly recommended.
(I added the tensegrity article Trigs recommended to my reading list too. These convos come with homework assignments! Haha).
Trigs:
You two have highlighted several key tensegrities- a tension that supports the integrity of a concept.
There is a tension between gift<>charity. Both uphold this concept of giving, but there is a tension between expectation of reciprocity and being free from obligation.
There is also this tension for gifts between being freely given, but not free from obligation for reciprocity.
There's also this tension on reciprocity. One side of it is a healthy sense of mutual obligation that creates a positive sum community. But on the other side is this propensity to use the obligation of mutualism to manipulate the behavior of others.
These core tensions are not necessarily solvable, but they can be resolved by systematically understanding that tension and maintaining the balance between them.
This is a fantastic read to learn more about this concept of tensegrity and why these tensions are necessary to exist, and not to just be "released" as a solution.
Tom:
Tension is a great way to think about it! And I've never heard the term "tensegrity" before—love it. Thanks for sharing the post, saving it to my queue to read.
Trigs: (in response to Tom's earlier comment)
I appreciate you diving into that component.
This is where it gets tricky with Blockchain because we can issue a "receipt of gift", but up until now everyone keeps trying to turn these receipts into speculative assets! 😩
So I think the path forward is in figuring out how to build onchain primitives that aren't inherently speculative, but still allow for creative emergent secondary value streams at an appropriate time down the road.
Proof of value first, THEN speculation and investment are possible.
Tom:
Yes, a common response is to look at it as an engineering problem. But I think (and Danica's comment above highlights this nicely) it's more of a cultural problem. How do you normalize and encourage different kinds of behaviors? Can you engineer that in, or do you need to use culture for that? My guess is that you have to change the culture. But culture and technology are linked together in feedback loops, so... a real "chicken and egg" problem!
Trigs:
Well said! This same discussion was happening in a call about DAOs this last week.
The conversation basically summed it up as culture before contracts and process before protocol. We have to establish the behavior first before we can build the technology that supports it!
Graphics by @bias
