The Ecosystem of the Web Industry
The web for some strange reason has made me money. I find it strange, at first, that people would pay so much for what I could do for them with a laptop and an internet connection. It marveled me that for the first time I could make money, a large sum of it, without leaving my apartment everyday; clocking in some work place. It felt cool. During my service year, I made more money remotely in a month than in my entire allowance.
As I progress however, I noticed I was actually Undercharging! I undercharged because I wasn’t aware of the market place and I didn’t even understand why people would be willing to pay that ‘High’ in the first place. There is an ecosystem that justifies the pay. My work as a web designer is not isolated from the need of a business owner to gain new customers and move into new territories.
Now, I have peeled off some layers and I understand the ecosystem a bit better.
The idea of the internet is to connect, to sort of make the whole world so interconnected that it would feel like a small place. Library that looks so big and intimating with so much books like can be erased to a simple text-box waiting for your search query. News that takes days to reach you can now interrupt your coffee with a simple notification.
In that world of easy connectivity, there are engineers that construct the interface, beefed up security from intruders, write languages for new technologies. Oddly, I belong to that ecosystem in the smallest bit, yet I belong. But there are those who offer a more comprehensive package, to those who need it and cannot pay lesser.
There is an ecosystem, how can you earn more understanding how the wheel works?
Share your thoughts, would love to hear what you think.