Is online content becoming corporate?

Content is king™, or is it? Ten or twenty years ago Google was dishing you out plethora of websites from all over the world, independent media and personal opinions were red and regarded. Nowadays, to surf the Web manually is a chore. Giant conglomerates as Facebook, Reddit and other social media outlets aggregate it and feed it to you from their platforms - for "free". At some point, such info consumption is convenient - as an Internet user you no longer need to skim through endless websites. On the other hand - it is a consumption and it became the downfall of the classic Web.

We no longer index our fingers over phone books, same way could be said about the search engines.

Aggregating the content

Imagine a vast farm with tonnes of vegetables and fruits, but half of them are rotten, do you have to walk the meadows by yourself and push your cart along, picking each crop by yourself, or do you want to sit at the table with the menu at your disposal? Very rustic example, right? These content changes alter the way we perceive and recognize the information, abandoning our own critical reckoning.

Getting the preprocessed information is more expedient, albeit dangerous. Should you trust the cook?

Should you trust the cook?

Big names feed you endless types of info, media- and celebrity-driven conglomerates satisfy you daily, whether it is news from the Guardian or updates from your YouTube subscriptions. But should you entrust them your time, identity and privacy? To some extent - as long as you know what you're doing. Is the information written or produced by them trustworthy or biased? Corporations are not sharing personal experience, they produce revenue.

The AI content

There is another niche in the wild-wild-Web - and it's the AI-driven content writers. Imagine a farm (again), where all the crops are fake! The AI content-writers are destroying the organic traffic creation in the classic definition of it, thus replacing the homo sapiens again. Human brains become redundant and with no reward for creating anything for the online content. Yet the demand for the online consumption grows. Could the aforementioned lead us into the regression of the human civilization?

Original content

Original content, as the result of your personal experience, will always be valued, but its time is limited. As long as it becomes valuable, the  AI replication takes place.

An AI 'behaviour', driven by algorithms, doesn't have any personality (at least yet), is not capable influencing us as much as human figures do, e.g. Insta people, etc. We humans value the likes of ourselves, but who do better than us. People driven by dreams and goals are the most common impelling figures. Could the AI become our next Insta star? This question is still open.

Social interest and engagement

The past strategy of "one-hit star" is no longer working, for there is a fierce competition and over-crowding in the social media. We're surrounded by a much more productive content than in any decade of out history - and it's the quality content, rather than a replication of success.

Competing against AI and social media became senseless around the year 2009, as the WWW turned into an ever-inflating universe of PR-ranked content. However, things change and more value issued by those, who produce more organic interest and engagement.

Content optimization:

Writing

Writing optimization - the incipient method of content creation since the dawn of the Internet. It is the backbone of your content. As long as it goes for human-written articles, keep meeting the main key points:

• will it help the reader?
• can you demonstrate the solution?
• can you demonstrate the product?
• can you prove your opinion?
• can you propose new ideas on the subject?

Technically speaking, online content creation should be straight to the point:

• be brief on the topic
• use the appropriate amount of text
• don't be over-prolific

Graphic design and media

Rich media and design go alongside your content, demonstrating the crux of your ideas. Your media should be:

• actual
• professional
• succinct
• and visual!

Upgrading your gear doesn't always mean a quality content - a good design can be achieved manually. Traditional content creation is already challenged by the AI bots, but what AI isn't capable of doing as of this date - is the character, persistence and inspiration of the human. Let's stay optimistic.