"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.)

  • @FarceOfWill
    3•4 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
      5•4 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.