The real reason 99 percent of content creators stay broke

Most content creators want to earn a living from their laptops and cameras. Unfortunately, it rarely works out for them for a few key reasons.

I’ve had the luxury of living the laptop lifestyle for going on six years now. I spent most of that time sports writing, but I know a thing or two about earning money in the cyber universe without relying on going somewhere for a day job.

But I’ve also seen a good 99 percent of everyone I know wanting to earn money through their creations work full-time day jobs outside the comfort of their laptops when a lot of them have more than enough talent to earn a living doing what they love.

It doesn’t matter if you’re a Substacker, YouTube creator, indie author, blogger, podcaster, Etsy, or Patreon creator. Odds are, you’ve never made a full-time living doing what you’re doing, and never will unless you make a few drastic but simple changes.

How I earned a full-time living as a remote sportswriter

Freelancing at the time for a mainstream brand helped, don’t get me wrong. But I knew who my audience was: Fans of the Buffalo Sabres who wanted more opinionated, fan-driven content that wasn’t sanitized. At the time, anyway—that became a different story in 2025.

I was also consistent and current with my content creation. After each game, I wrote a quick, 300-400-word piece, then I engaged with fans on social media. Note, I said engaged, meaning I didn’t link dump every damn article I wrote, which would’ve turned the pages into spam farms.

I also showed up all seven days a week, meaning I didn’t take vacations or weekends off. I poured my heart and soul into achieving my dream at the time of ultimately making it as a full-time sportswriter, and it manifested in Jan. 2024.

It gave me a full-time salary between $50,000 and $60,000 a year, and I spent most of my day talking and writing about hockey. From Jan. 2024 to Sep. 2025, it was a dream job before management messed up and started turning us into drones.

In other words, I treated my Sabres and later Red Wings coverage like a freedom-based business. And for some background info, Buffalo was a small-market hockey team that had been terrible for ages. Not the easiest team to drive traffic and interest for, and in a borderline niche sport.

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