If a group of people interacts with each other long enough, does business automatically happen?

Was it inevitable that we'd have a passion economy?

"Passion economy" is a new term that I learned from a recent post here on Indiehackers, having only read it a few days ago and filed it away in my mind, but today I came across a real life example of it. I had randomly decided to visit a Youtube channel, Extra Credits, that I've occasionally watched over the years. In the beginning they only produced videos talking about game design, but over time they added mythology, history, and sci-fi. In an update video for 2020, they announced that they were in the process of adding new writers to their team, promoting a new piece of merch, and changing the structure of their Patreon. I also learned that they have a member-only discussion space.

All of these changes were examples of the community driven business described in the post I referenced earlier, and I have to admit genuine surprise at finding it in a niche that I'm so familiar with. Anyway, what I'm curious to know is what other people think about this outcome and if anyone else is also surprised.