The rampant expansion of capitalism affects us all. As the years go by, its effects become more and more apparent, as its seemingly unlimited reach sets the course for pretty much every aspect of our lives. Be it politics, finances, technology, or even sports and art, capitalism has the final word in everything these days.

Regardless of which side of the fence you’re sitting on, capitalistic practices have altered our way of living, and they will most likely continue to do so for the foreseeable future.

Ideally, every project or endeavor should be governed based on the merit of its own goals and the vision of the creative minds behind it. However, in contemporary society this concept is becoming more and more utopian. In this day and age, rarely do we get high-budget projects that pursue a noble, non-profit objective.

Of course, the people who work on any project deserve to be compensated for their effort. However, these monetary pursuits are not born out of need, and more often than not, they are not instigated by the actual creators sweating and striving to realize their ambitions, but instead they are guided by a board of shareholders and directors in an office someplace else.

In the same vein, people working in finance, politics, and other positions of power are inclined to pursue tangible results and revenue, which is understandable. However, tunnel vision is hardly ever a good approach to any cause. By isolating the actual creators and those for which the project is being made for from the equation, leads to key decisions being made by people with little to no awareness about the project’s actual identity, vision, goal, and very nature.

This phenomenon can be seen in just about any industry. From sports to music and from TV to gaming, shareholders dictate almost everything. When bright minds are limited and bent to the will of algorithms and revenue projections, then art, creativity, and free expression tend to suffer greatly.

Take streaming for example. Since the emergence of Netflix and other similar platforms, the face of TV (with cinema likely to follow suit) as we knew it, has completely shifted. Back in the day, TV shows could be afforded the time to find their creative footing, establish characters and their dynamics over time. Nowadays, most shows hardly ever get renewed, regardless of their reception, if the numbers don’t line up with the expectations of those making the decisions. At the same time, shows that are commercially successful get stretched beyond recognition. Season after season, spin-off after spin-off, everything must become a franchise in the 2026 landscape. 

Similar issues have been plaguing the gaming industry for at least a decade at this point, with companies investing seemingly endless amounts of money on projects no one seems to care about, in vain attempts to replicate the unprecedented success of Fortnite.

You could apply the same or similar principles to just about anything in the modern era, with the same issues occurring each time.

It is easy to surmise that these profit-driven policies, which get increasingly more relentless, with a hint of desperation, as the years go by, distort the inherent purpose of any creative project.

What this means essentially is that new ideas that keep our society moving forward are not getting any financial backing, unless they’re bent to serve a very specific purpose.

This is where independent efforts come into play and begin to thrive. And people have taken notice. 

At this year’s Game Awards, half of the ‘Game of the Year’ nominees, including the eventual winner, came from an independent background.

Similarly, with Spotify’s subscription fees constantly on the rise, while the algorithm promotes AI artists over actual artists, multiple users have begun migrating to Bandcamp. Bandcamp offers over 80% of its revenue back to the artists, while Spotify pays artists $0.003-$0.005 per stream. For an artist to make a single dollar off their work and dedication to their craft, 200 to 333 people would need to stream their song. 

Finally, the same can be said for cinema, with indie scenes across the world gaining more and more traction, while traditional, established franchises, while still immensely profitable, are showing clear signs of decline.

At the end of the day, the best course of action for the average person is to think critically, and to vote with their wallet.