Give away your recipes

While trying to learn how to make sourdough bread, I ran across this site. The author gives away all his recipes and techniques in elaborate detail. Meanwhile, he's also trying to sell those same breads and get people to enroll in baking classes to learn those same techniques.

Doesn't seem too smart -- why bother to buy or attend class when all the facts are right there?

Surprisingly, that's actually a great way to build your career: once you establish your expertise, teach it to someone else.

One of two things will happen when you try to train others in your expertise.

1. they will learn it. That means it wasn't that complicated, not worth keeping to yourself, and likely to be "discovered" by other person soon enough. At least you got some goodwill out of it.
2. they won't learn it, or at least not as well as you. This will impress upon them how deep your knowledge is and cement your standing as the expert.

For the sourdough man, all those details hint at so much more that could be gleaned by spending a day with him. And given his command of all those details, his bread must taste awesome.

This strikes me as a kind of personal freemium strategy, involving one's own know-how.

More importantly, this demonstrates how mentoring, sharing your knowledge, and training your replacement are fundamental ways of advancing your career -- all riffs on the same theme, under different circumstances. Giving away your recipes is another way to say it.