Anyone else find themselves on the other side of the outrage fence more and more these days?

Perhaps I’m getting old, perhaps I’m scanning too many clickbait headlines, maybe it’s the time I spend on social media looking for news but finding abuse.

Regardless, it’s getting harder and harder to become informed without being coloured by curated ‘groundswells’ of anger and opposition.

The latest that caught my eye? An apparent ‘Uproar After It Was Revealed Australian Open Ball Kids Work for Free’.

Now I’m all for people being paid their worth, and understand it’s a slippery slope between gaining experience and exploitation, but surely I’m not the only one who thought, ‘well of course they do and so they should’?

To be clear, I have no idea what goes into being a ball kid and I can only imagine how much work it takes to learn and then remember all of the systems that are in place to ensure the quickest rolling of balls to the person who needs them most.

Then there’s the heat (why do we hold the tournament in the middle of our treacherous summers?), the grumpy players and hundreds of squats and arm-lifts they do each match.

Wearing those strange caps with the back flap would be enough to do me in.

In fact, there’s been many a game I’ve watched from my comfy couch, with the air-conditioning blowing in my face, that I’ve thought that not for all the green balls on Rod Laver Area would I do that.

Turns out, that’s exactly what they’ve been doing it for.

Yet despite that, the opportunity is so popular, that more than 2500 tennis-loving kids try out for the privilege each year with under 500 getting through to the main game(s).

In short, they sprint at the chance to get close to their idols. I imagine the sheer thrill of being on the same court as a Djokovic, Swiatek, Gauff or Tsitsipas would be something money just couldn’t buy.

So should organisers pay them for what they see as a privilege?

They used to think they should, with ball kids getting cash until being reclassified as volunteers in 2008 meaning a prize pack replaced something bankable.

And it’s not like there’s not enough money going around right?

This year a record $ 76.5 million will be handed out in prize money at the Australian Open, with the singles champion taking home a cool $2.975 million.

You could definitely argue that throwing a couple of hundred bucks the way of each kid would hardly see a dent in the back pockets of the top players. While I’m sure the young ones are fed with plenty of cold sandwiches and hydrated by the appropriately sponsored drinks, it would still be a fair way off the corporate box catering bill.

But then are you losing the magic of it all?  Are you losing what so many of us went through growing up, which for me was one of the best ways to learn that sometimes it’s the work itself that’s the reward?

I remember being so desperate to get into swim coaching, I would see every sunrise just to be around Olympic standard athletes and watch how they prepare, helping out in any way I could.

A friend from high school knocked on doors and worked for free to get enough experience so she could become a florist.

Disappointingly, she’s a podiatrist now after discovering an allergy to pollen, but as kids we weren’t chasing payment, but instead, a window into a world we wanted so badly to be a part of, we were happy to do whatever we could to open that next door that might just lead to our dream. Or in my friend’s case, a completely new career direction.

Whilst being able to see Rafael Nadal pick his undies out of his bum at close range isn’t my cup of tea, I’ve a sneaky suspicion that if you asked the kids themselves if they would go on strike until they’re paid, they wouldn’t have a bar of it.

So are the organisers of the Australian Open taking advantage of these kids?

Possibly, in fact, probably.

But maybe there’s still room for it to be love all.

Ali Clarke presents the breakfast show on Mix 102.3. She is a regular columnist for InDaily.