The True Cost of Free Content
I’ve long been an advocate of leveraging the experience of others to learn.
Tools, courses, memberships, study groups, 1:1 coaching… I’ve sought these out since the start of my poker career, both inside and outside of the game.
In fact, I currently have five coaches:
Two mental game/performance coaches
A life/career coach
A health & fitness coach
A social media coach
You could even say I have poker coaches, too, but I don’t pay them – we help each other.
I’ve also spent countless amounts on courses and other training tools.
All that to say — I practice what I preach.
But with all the free content out there,
do you even need to pay for training?
What if you’re a relative beginner or playing small stakes — in poker or whatever else you want to learn?
Abundant Resources
There’s so much free content available these days.
We’ll stick to poker since that’s likely why you’re here. How many ways are there to learn for free?
Televised poker streams are everywhere. You can watch great players play!
There are endless YouTube videos, many of which involve some element of teaching.
There are Twitch streams available 24/7. Someone is always online playing poker and showing you exactly what they’re doing in every spot they encounter.
There are Twitter (X) threads, Instagram Reels, TikToks… the list goes on and on.
I make content on all of these platforms (besides Twitch lately). Plus, I write these newsletters!
Surely I’m in favor of you consuming them if I make them, right?
Sort of.
Let’s get into it…
The Cost of Free
For many people, there’s a line in the sand between free and paid content.
Yes, they see a difference between $5 and $500, but the line between $0 and $1 is disproportionately thick.
(People do the same thing at the poker table: Into a pot of $30, a $3 bet is almost identical to a check when comparing it to a $30 bet. Yet when that line between check and bet is crossed, it can feel much different.)
Let’s take this newsletter, for example.
I’m releasing a newsletter every week, and they’re free.
How would you feel if I started charging $1/month for them? Would you pay it?
The majority of you wouldn’t.
But why is that?
Perhaps the educational value isn’t worth $1/mo to you. Perhaps you would never pay money for written posts like these, regardless of what was in them.
However, you will spend 5-10 minutes reading my posts without thinking twice.
Let’s pretend you earn $24/hr.
Just five minutes of your time and attention is worth $2.
So why would that extra ~$0.23 per post stop you?
Cost #1: Your Time
I’m not arguing against that line in your mind between free and paid. I just want you to start thinking more seriously about the value of your time.
Let’s say you want to learn poker, and your options are to spend:
A) 150 hours watching free Twitch streams and YouTube videos
B) $150 and 10 hours on a course that’s targeted to your needs
Most people choose A over B.
Not only do they spend $3,000+ worth of time* to save $150…
They learn less in the process.
*Yes, it’s not apples to apples. Obligatory Disclaimers:
People watch/read for entertainment, too.
You could find great free content.
You could find bad paid content.
Etc.
The point is that many people are careful with their wallets while being extraordinarily reckless with their time.
I’m not here to tell you whether or not to be frugal.
I’m just pointing out that your time is a precious resource, too.
Cost #2: Bad Advice
Learning from free content can cost you in other ways.
What if you watch a Twitch stream from a mediocre player, and you’re led astray?
What if you watch a stream from an expert player who’s playing in conditions drastically different than your own, and they’re not explaining their reasoning because they never intended for the stream to be educational to small-stakes players?
That’s not only costing you time – it’s costing you money at the table by making you play worse or teaching you bad habits that inhibit your growth later on.
This can be extremely expensive.
Now, can it happen with paid content?
Sure.
You can get bad advice from coaches that you pay, too, but it’s less likely.
There are far fewer people making paid content, and they’re stronger teachers on average than those making free content. Plus, most importantly, they’re making a product specifically designed to teach you.
The opposite can be true of free content:
My most popular YouTube videos
tend to be my least educational ones.
I try and try to make videos that I think will help people improve, but the majority (and the algorithm) clearly want content that’s geared more towards entertainment.
So, finding videos on YouTube with a ton of views, and even great comments, doesn’t often lead to the best education.
Finding coaches or courses with good reviews usually will.
Cost #3: (Lack of) Leverage
Bad content can lead you to play worse, but what about good content?
Let’s say you play $2/$5 NL, and you’re going to play around 30hrs/week for the next five years, and there’s a course, a tool, or a coach that can improve your winrate by 2bb/100…
That’s a $78,000 gain.
Not to mention:
Compounding growth and returns from the right learning path
Fewer and shorter downswings due to higher winrates
The ripple effects of that on your overall EV and happiness
Is this example overly simplistic? Yes.
Does it illustrate a very real point? Absolutely.
Investing in yourself pays dividends for years to come.
I used five years as the example above, but I’ve been playing poker for 18 years so far since I first got coaching.
Quick Note
I feel the need to state the obvious:
In addition to making free content, I own a company that makes paid content, so I’m incentivized to tell you to spend more money.
I hope, if you’re subscribed to my newsletter, you know me well enough to know that this isn’t the motivation for this post.
There are plenty of other sources of paid content and coaching. Check them all out!
What to Take Away
I’m not telling you that free content sucks. I make tons of free content, and my goal is to make it not suck!
There is free content out there that can help you improve.
But can you correctly distinguish the good from the bad?
And could you have learned more in a fraction of the time by parting with a few dollars?
Think about your time and money more fluidly.
Blur the distinct boundary between $0 and $1, and guard your time more vigilantly.
For example:
Did you get a return on the time you invested reading this?
