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Sovereign writers and Substack

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Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#31

Post by inglor_cz »

ceilingcorner wrote: post #17
slibhb wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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.

To be honest, writing is a kind of art and what you describe has always been important among artistically gifted people.

Introverted and shy geniuses tend to be discovered after their deaths, if ever.

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#32

Post by gfosco »

redisman wrote: post #13
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.

They are however outrageous to the far-left journos at mainstream publications, which is why there's so much attention focused on Substack right now. Trump won't go anywhere that he doesn't get to own a significant portion of the business, so he'll have to build his own site (which it is already reported that he is doing.)

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#33

Post by ceilingcorner »

inglor_cz wrote: post #31
ceilingcorner wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

To be honest, writing is a kind of art and what you describe has always been important among artistically gifted people. Introverted and shy geniuses tend to be discovered after their deaths, if ever.

No, that really isn't true at all. Some of the most famous writers and artists throughout history were terrible at self-promotion.

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#34

Post by inglor_cz »

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.

True, but messing with people like Greenwald, Tufekci, Taibbi, Yglesias, Sullivan etc. at the same time is bound to get Stripe into a world of hurt.

These are names with a following and they have strong incentive to stick together if anyone on Substack is threatened with financial cancellation.

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#35

Post by WJW »

mc32 wrote: post #6
jger15 wrote: post #2

"...it’s not that Substack will compete with existing publications for their best writers, but rather that Substack makes it easy for the best writers to discover their actual market value." Thompson on point per usual

And that raises a question. What will readers value? Will they value rigorous writers who may provide discomfort or engaging writers who write to choirs?

Presumably different audiences will prefer different writers, as they always have.

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#36

Post by inglor_cz »

ceilingcorner wrote: post #33
inglor_cz wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be honest, writing is a kind of art and what you describe has always been important among artistically gifted people. Introverted and shy geniuses tend to be discovered after their deaths, if ever.

No, that really isn't true at all. Some of the most famous writers and artists throughout history were terrible at self-promotion.

Well we are talking more about financial success, right? Or that was my impression from the debate. Even the original article revolves around $$$.

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#37

Post by bhupy »

abhinav22 wrote: post #30

Substack’s business model doesn’t make sense. They are just using VC money to try and build social platform, but it’s a flawed one at best: - MOST people will not want to pay for articles. Especially in an ever increasing world of subscription payments across tv, music, SaaS, I really don’t see how email newsletters will be high on people’s lists - for the quality writers that people do want to pay, they will eventua…

I guess my questions are:

- Does it have to appeal to "MOST" people for it to be a viable dividends-paying business?

- Does it have to be the "landing page / YouTube of articles" in order to be a viable dividends-paying business?

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#38

Post by criddell »

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.

Substack themselves have a ToS. In theory Substack could always switch payment processors or allow crypto currency payment, but you can never get out from under their ToS.

For example, you couldn't publish something like 2600 there because they discuss illegal activities like blue boxing.

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#39

Post by ghaff »

michaelt wrote: post #26

> [...] writers who can command a paying audience have heretofore been significantly underpaid. I don't know for sure, but I suspect the writer-paid-monthly model is straight up more effective at pulling money from readers' pockets than the magazine subscription model. I mean, I can pay £34 a year for a fortnightly magazine with quite a few writers doing quite a lot of investigative journalism, and even mailing a pap…

How many people will actually pay $120/year though. I pay in that ballpark for the NYT and The Economist. But it seems borderline nuts to pay that for a single author's newsletter unless they're delivering unique insights that I can turn into a lot more money than that. Or maybe is they do a really good job of covering a niche hobby although that's still almost certainly more than a niche hobby magazine would charge.

Re: Sovereign writers and Substack

#40

Post by ceilingcorner »

inglor_cz wrote: post #36
ceilingcorner wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, that really isn't true at all. Some of the most famous writers and artists throughout history were terrible at self-promotion.

Well we are talking more about financial success, right? Or that was my impression from the debate. Even the original article revolves around $$$.

I'm just concerned that journalists will become more like celebrities. Less concerned with the cold facts and more with giving their take.

Frankly a similar thing has already happened in the art world. Banksy, Jeff Koons, and Damien Hirst are fantastic marketers, not artists.

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