From the experiences shared by creatives, luck, relevance, consistency, patience, and talent play a huge role in succeeding as a creative. This work requires significant investments of both time and money, to produce quality work and build an audience. They mentioned worrying about being a short-lived success—a case of here today gone tomorrow. Many also struggle to turn their creative hobbies into long-term sustainable careers.
Like social commerce and emerging forms of social farming, discussed in accompanying reports, creative workers show social creativity. These new forms of livelihood entail new trade-offs, tensions, and vulnerabilities for creatives on the online social hustle to sell their work, especially in relational labor. For this to be a sustainable source of livelihood, creatives want 1) to learn how to convert their craft into a business 2)more transparency when it comes to platform payments, and 3) appreciation for creative work from clients, something some have been trying to achieve through showcasing behind the scenes. Platforms should concentrate on not just how the creatives distribute their work but also on how much they earn and how they get paid.
Creatives’ frustrations and failures alternate with hopes of a big win; they turn to digital platforms to find inspiration, consistently produce content to engage their audiences, and turn their passion and talent into livelihoods.