[vertex-four]

> If I want someone to pay me for programming, I have to write something they want. The same is true for writers.

Yes, although the argument in this particular thread is that writing is ~broadly~ underrewarded and that is OK because markets. Attempting to influence a market to reward people better is considered to be a bad thing - the only way people should be able to do that is by not participating in the market, according to many. Unless it's to do with programming. But not game development.

[Nadya]

"Selling used bubblegum also suffers from being underrewarded. I spent all this time chewing gum and nobody wants to buy it? How's that fair for me? I chewed the gum - I deserve to be paid!"

Just because you do something (regardless of the value of doing that thing) doesn't mean you deserve to be paid for doing that thing. Especially if nobody is interested in paying you to do that thing.

So yes. It is "OK because markets". If you expect to be rewarded for your writing, make sure there is a marketable interest in what you will be writing. You may have to make an MVP (maybe the first and second chapters) to test the waters, but that isn't different from a programmer needing to make an MVP to test the waters for their potential product.

[vertex-four]

The issue is that the exact same communities which decry writers for asking that they get paid what they think they're worth, will cry that the entire software development market outside the SV bubble is "unfair" to developers because it's not paying SV market prices.

They also cry about immigrants taking their jobs at lower rates, outsourcing, people choosing to hire the new grad instead of the expert, and plenty of other things that could be responded to with "it's OK because markets".