> Most of these people are thinking about content creation as the goal and making money and an unfortunate side requirement.

If you put it that way, then I don't feel any remorse at all for people who are complaining that content creation can't pay the bills. It's not any different than any other hobby.

It seems like a universal basic income would address this "unfortunate side requirement" better than somehow making all youtubers get paid enough to make rent. This would let people take the risk of doing content creation, either they get lucky and make a lot of money or they can indefinitely subsist on UBI. In the end society wins (in my opinion) by getting lots of people doing stuff they are interested in.

The proposals for UBI have always seemed like a replacement of welfare where it’s a survivable amount of money but not ideal, so you are encouraged to find well paying work but can afford to take time off to train or find something new.

The thing is, we don’t need to encourage people to become content creators because we already have more than enough content being created and any more would mostly be a waste.

The good thing about capitalist markets is they are able to prioritise things that are in need reasonably well. Once that need is met, prices move to stabilise that balance.

I’m all for the ubi to replace welfare but I don’t think it will do wonders for creative people who will never turn it in to a higher paying job.

Which, unfortunately, is the incorrect way to think if you larger goal is to afford rent and food.

When I was finishing high school, I had to choose between music or comp-sci for university. Went with comp-sci because I didn't think as a trumpet player I would be able to do much, besides being one of the 5 (citation needed) teachers in my city, or being VERY lucky and survive playing gigs, mostly which would be playing music I didn't like.

It worked well for me, as I ended up having a couple bands, and also did some freelance gigs. Because it was my hobby - I didn't care for money, as I got a job - I could go full Marie Kondo and only play what gave me joy.

Making it big on YouTube requires “selling out” to some extent. For example, clickbait titles and extreme video thumbnails. I’ve seen a handful of channels that had good content in the real estate space go down this route recently and I’m sad about the loss of high quality content, but their views (and thus ad revenue) has never been higher.