And unfortunately artistic endeavours have a very sharp earnings pyramid. If you're the most commercially successful writer in the world (let's say JK Rowling maybe) you will earn hundreds of millions, even billions, whereas there are millions of other writers (doing the same thing, just without the massive breakthrough) earning nothing or virtually nothing. Compare that to a job like - car mechanic. The most commercially successful car mechanic in the world (perhaps a motorsport chief engineer in F1 or Nascar) might be on a million, probably not even that, and even a trainee out of car mechanic school will likely being paid more than nothing. It's a flatter earnings pyramid. I'm not making a judgment on whether this is fair tor right, I'm just pointing it out. We wouldn't think it acceptable that a car mechanic work for free, but we seem OK with some writers earning billions and others nothing. Both put words on a page.