I have a business model for Polymaths with which I am quite enamored. I think it will provide Polymathicans (People who cherish erudition through lifelong learning, objectivity and intellectual discipline) with a robust and personally satisfying menu of news, analysis, commentary as well as social media.
It works like this. Participants will pay $12 per year to join Polymaths. While that will be used for promotion and administration, it also will provide access to the social media platform. Then, they will subscribe to those Polymaths they want at the rate of pay $12 per year. Right now, that is I and nobody else. But I am openly soliciting others to participate and those engaged in administration will pick up the cudgel and move forth. In the fullness of time we will discover how many Polymaths the system will support, but my preliminary estimate is about two dozen.
The idea is that people can assemble their own custom programming, perhaps 6 Polymaths for $7 per month. In other words, you only pay for what you want. On Fox Nation, you pay $6 per month, even if you only want one person's content. On Blaze TV, you pay $8.25 per month. Daily Wire charges $20 per month with a limited service subscription for $12.00 per month.
One Polymath might provide ½ hour of straight news every day (I'd subscribe to that). Another might do life extension, AI, transhumanism, etc.. Another might run a 'call in' show changing topics daily. Etc.
In my case subscribers will get 60 to 90 minutes per week of podcasts and a number of articles and white papers. For $1 per month, I think that is more than fair.
For the subscribers, there are three major advantages. One, there will be no ads. Either the content is worth $1 per month or it is not. The decision will be made by you, not by corporate advertisers or network executives. Two, nobody will invade your privacy by tracking you and/or selling your information to third parties. Three, you will gain access at a higher level of intellectual sophisticatiom than is available elsewhere. The market at this level is just too small to be supported by an ad supported business model but works just fine with a subscription model.
The math is straightforward ... 10K subscribers = 120K USD gross revenue. 100K subscribers = 1,200,000 USD. Between the two is where I would expect most Polymaths to find themselves.
Anyway, I need some organizational partners and, of course, Polymaths to create content. You certainly should register at Polymaths.Locals.com if you are interested in either producing or consuming intellectually sophisticated analysis, commentary and/or discussion.
