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Sovereign writers and Substack

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Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#11

Post by nickysielicki »

ceilingcorner wrote: post #3

Of course things aren’t so simple; Sullivan, like several of the other names on that leaderboard, are, to put it gently, controversial. That he along with other lightning-rod writers ended up on Substack is more a matter of where else would they go? While Substack is portrayed as being a good move for writers and journalists (and certainly it is, financially), I don't think this is actually good for journalism as a w…

That's a strawman and a half.

World-improving journalism follows a Pareto distribution where 90% of non-submarine hard-hitting journalism is done by 10% of the journalists and the rest just exist to peddle influence. The industry has been under pressure for a long time due to the death of print media, and substack just represents the 10% cutting the fat.

Good riddance. Learn to code.

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#12

Post by [deleted] »

capableweb wrote: post #10
ceilingcorner wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is kind of a use-case for Bitcoin, no?

It's the planned/future use-case for Bitcoin, yes. As of now, you cannot pay a lot of your daily expenses with Bitcoin so you still need a way of going from Bitcoin to USD/EUR/$LOCAL_CURRENCY so instead of Visa and Mastercard being the gatekeepers, the centralized exchange facilitating the fiat-trade is now the gatekeeper instead.

[deleted]

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#13

Post by redisman »

analyte123 wrote: post #8

The writers aren't completely "sovereign" as long as they are using Stripe (and Visa and Mastercard) to process payments. It is basically inevitable that some entity in the payment system will eventually interfere with Substack even if Substack themselves hold the line.

I guess we're waiting to find out if Trump or someone will start writing there. The current big boys are all non-woke center left/right so they're not actually at all outrageous to the general public.

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#14

Post by snicksnak »

ceilingcorner wrote: post #3

Of course things aren’t so simple; Sullivan, like several of the other names on that leaderboard, are, to put it gently, controversial. That he along with other lightning-rod writers ended up on Substack is more a matter of where else would they go? While Substack is portrayed as being a good move for writers and journalists (and certainly it is, financially), I don't think this is actually good for journalism as a w…

> I don't want the tactics of Kim Kardashian to be the model of a future journalist.

Most mayor news outlets (including NYT) run branded/sponsored content. I doubt that you will see that on substack.

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#15

Post by Dirlewanger »

ceilingcorner wrote: post #3

Of course things aren’t so simple; Sullivan, like several of the other names on that leaderboard, are, to put it gently, controversial. That he along with other lightning-rod writers ended up on Substack is more a matter of where else would they go? While Substack is portrayed as being a good move for writers and journalists (and certainly it is, financially), I don't think this is actually good for journalism as a w…

Old media and Buzzfeed-esque rags had their chance to write quality journalism in the nascent Internet age. They've failed spectacularly and are tearing society apart. If this is the way forward for the time being, so be it.

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#16

Post by ceilingcorner »

zpeti wrote: post #5
ceilingcorner wrote: post #3

Of course things aren’t so simple; Sullivan, like several of the other names on that leaderboard, are, to put it gently, controversial. That he along with other lightning-rod writers ended up on Substack is more a matter of where else would they go? While Substack is portrayed as being a good move for writers and journalists (and certainly it is, financially), I don't think this is actually good for journalism as a w…

My perception of old media is that they are doing exactly this, writing click bait things to get clicks and subs. This is true across the board from CNN to NYT to Fox. At least with substack the incentives are not there for daily churn articles, the journalists have independence to publish when they want to, how they want to, worst case they lost subscribers. I think those incentives make them a lot less likely to ma…

Agreed, old media already does this. The question is: does switching to an individual-focused model actually address the underlying issues?

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#17

Post by ceilingcorner »

slibhb wrote: post #7
ceilingcorner wrote: post #3

Of course things aren’t so simple; Sullivan, like several of the other names on that leaderboard, are, to put it gently, controversial. That he along with other lightning-rod writers ended up on Substack is more a matter of where else would they go? While Substack is portrayed as being a good move for writers and journalists (and certainly it is, financially), I don't think this is actually good for journalism as a w…

> writing controversial things because it gets more traffic and therefore more income. This is a danger but I'd rather have "controversial" than "if you deviate from the politics of the publication that pays your salary, you get fired". Personally, I like Sullivan, Greenwald, Yglesias, Taibbi, etc. I think Sullivan and Yglesias are not drama queens and that Geenwald and Tiabbi are. But I like all 4, I just think the…

I don't dislike them, I just dislike the idea that becoming a successful journalist will now mean you must also be charismatic, good at attracting attention to yourself, etc.

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#18

Post by danpalmer »

I find the current criticism of Substack quite interesting. It seems to be on the assumption that they are a publisher, or at least a visible brand in the publishing process, and they do indeed appear to be in the middle unlike most companies.

It's obvious that the NYT are responsible for what's published on their site, after all it says NYT across the top, NYT on the subscription fee, and they (theoretically) have editorial control.

On the other hand it's obvious that Stripe (for example) are not responsible for what's published on Stratechery, they are invisible to the customer, and I think most reasonable people would not suggest that Stripe exercise moral judgement on Stratechery and decline the business unless Ben Thompson crossed a line that is very far from acceptable (likely bordering on illegality).

But Substack is both. Their name is in the URL, writers are found via Substack, articles say "published on Substack" on them. They are trying to claim that they are just a backend and that it's up to writers what they publish, but they are in fact a frontend at least in part for the customer, and therefore any decision or lack thereof is taking a moral standpoint.

I think Substack are going to have to decide whether they want to own that responsibility, and become known for a certain "type" of content, or whether they want to fade into the background and let the writers' brands take over.

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#19

Post by ceilingcorner »

danpalmer wrote: post #18

I find the current criticism of Substack quite interesting. It seems to be on the assumption that they are a publisher, or at least a visible brand in the publishing process, and they do indeed appear to be in the middle unlike most companies. It's obvious that the NYT are responsible for what's published on their site, after all it says NYT across the top, NYT on the subscription fee, and they (theoretically) have e…

They are just using the same playbook as the rest of Silicon Valley. Twitter and Facebook manage to never be considered a platform or a publisher, and they won't be until legislation requires it.

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#20

Post by danpalmer »

ceilingcorner wrote: post #19
danpalmer wrote: post #18

I find the current criticism of Substack quite interesting. It seems to be on the assumption that they are a publisher, or at least a visible brand in the publishing process, and they do indeed appear to be in the middle unlike most companies. It's obvious that the NYT are responsible for what's published on their site, after all it says NYT across the top, NYT on the subscription fee, and they (theoretically) have e…

They are just using the same playbook as the rest of Silicon Valley. Twitter and Facebook manage to never be considered a platform or a publisher, and they won't be until legislation requires it.

People view things like Substack as closer to traditional news publishing/writing and quite differently to social media so I think they're starting from a position of far higher expectations.

But regardless, Twitter and Facebook are becoming more well known for their positions on these issues. Twitter is known for having a "lefty bubble" and taking a long time to "ban nazis". Facebook is known for having everyone's conspiracy theory loving Uncle.

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