# [[Technology expands access to culture but diminishes its value]] ###### October 15, 2024 Printing books was quicker than writing them by hand. Shooting movies with digital cameras is less risky than doing it on analog film stock. A worldwide movie release on a streaming platform is cheaper than a global roll-out in cinema. And sharing that cute video of your cat with everyone is far easier done by smartphone than it used to be in the times of 8mm home video. As Technology progresses, we see the hurdles for producing cultural output becoming smaller and smaller. This is once again a good and a bad thing at the same time. On the bright side, it is much easier now to produce content than it ever was, allowing many more people to participate in sharing creative expressions on a semi-professional level. [[Hollywood is dead, but it may yet be reborn|Hollywood is struggling today]], partially because it is now possible to produce high-end movies in many places of the globe.  But the explosion of available content has also led to an ever increasing competition for the attention of oversaturated audiences. Due to the economic pressure, working conditions in the creative field turn worse and worse with every disruption. Yesterday's computer-aided animation is today's LLM: it is possible to do more with less, which is usually good for the ones paying the bills, but not so much for the ones committed to the craft. "Art" becoming "Content" is the result of Technology bear hugging Culture. Of course we should never discount the possibility of things turning around. An annoying abundance of cheap content will create desire for other forms of culture eventually. Today's obsolete crafts will be rediscovered in a yet-to-be-born movement rejecting a future status quo derived from today's cutting edge. But we are not there yet.