In a nutshell; everything has become about the business model. The main emphasis is placed on marketing, does the author have a "platform" etc. After all, without revenue we can't make any of this happen. Even though publishing has been helped along by the advent of digital media, someone has to buy in order for the author to make his or her way in the world. The cost for your kids braces don't change based on your popularity as a writer. Few writers write purely for the sole purpose of putting their thoughts down on paper. There are those who journal but most of them don't think of publishing those for all the world to read.

It's not that making an income is such a bad thing but when money is the main motivator it affects the work being produced. Writing that is done solely for the purpose of becoming a successful business venture is suspect in it's motives. Why, you ask, is it suspect? Because the writer is not being rewarded for their greatest gift but is rewarded by what people "want" to read. Oh, and what is the greatest gift the writers has to offer; the ability to think and think well, beyond the gloss of uninformed opinion. The writer might be an artful wordsmith with impressive grammatical skills but it's their thinking that is really the gift. Those who can think well and also write have a greater chance at being heard and remembered; which is what we all want, after all.

So what does this mean? In some genre's of writing it might not make a big difference but when it comes to ideas that shape others; who don't think much but let others speak for them it makes a huge difference. If we use a good business model as the criteria for deciding what ideas are worth publishing and shaping public thought are we really on solid ground. If reading is on a decline, is thinking on a decline also and if that be true is our future being shaped by publishing that may only have a good business model?