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We’re the founders of Substack, we just launched an iOS app. AUA

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Re: We’re the founders of Substack, we just launched an iOS app. AUA

#101

Post by sshine »

cjbest wrote: post #61
the_reformation wrote: post #33

Hey guys, big fans of Substack (writer/reader since 2019.) My favorite part of Substack was how it built on top of email, an (actual) distributed protocol. I'm able to access my Substack writers alongside other writers/publication, since everybody integrates into email. I like the reader experience of the new app and the recommendations, but I'm worried it will become another walled garden like Medium. How do you pla…

Thanks! Our goal with the app is to give a seamless upgrade to the email experience -- which is why the home page works just like an inbox -- while having writers retain ownership of their list (which therefore gives them exit rights.) We don't want to be a walled garden. We want to make a great reading experience, with porous boundaries. If you publish on Substack, it goes everywhere - email, the web, other networks…

> “We make it simple to start a paid newsletter.”

> We don't want to be a walled garden.

Is it just me, or do those not align completely?

A paid newsletter, as in you get access if you pay, is by definition a walled garden.

I understand that because Substack and its writers both benefit from publicly available material, since it draws organic traffic. But it seems that that's not at odds with also wanting a walled garden. The difference may be the size and shape of the garden fence door. Medium is annoying by tricking you into clicking stuff that you can't read unless you sign up. Building an app seems like it could lead there. Not because you want to, but because of thinking centralised rather than decentralised.

My favourite newsletter, Haskell Weekly, distributes an article list with a summary by email, but the links go to anywhere on the web, usually personal blogs. Maybe some people like to have an app as it then functions as a browser dedicated to particular reading purpose(s). I'd personally prefer browser links. That's where I read everything and sync tabs/bookmarks between phone and computer. I hope you don't get those annoying pop-ups that keep encouraging people to install the app even though they clicked no thanks. Like Reddit. Just because the fence is mostly see-through, it still counts like a wall. :-D

Re: We’re the founders of Substack, we just launched an iOS app. AUA

#102

Post by shortformblog »

I’m sure that you probably know my opinion on all this already (given my general loudness about newsletter things in general, as the editor of Tedium), but I’d love to see you offer options to create ecosystem options that don’t rely on having to publish on Substack proper.

It seems like creators could use the support of something like Substack without being tied to the publishing platform itself. That seems like a real opportunity.

I really don’t like the idea of newsletter platforms expanding beyond email, because the reasons why we’re using email in the first place is because it’s platform-agnostic. So your company launching an app really gives me pause. But creators I’ve talked to over the past day or so are in more of a wait-and-see mode.

I realize I’m not the target audience for your service as-is. I prefer self-hosting things like my website, I want to code my template myself, and don’t want to charge my readers a subscription fee. But I think some of the services you offer do not need the publishing platform you’ve created for it.

It could be a way to help the newsletter ecosystem without making it dependent on the URL and how we choose to publish.

Re: We’re the founders of Substack, we just launched an iOS app. AUA

#103

Post by Mandatum »

internet_jockey wrote: post #82
Mandatum wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

++ The Kaka https://thekaka.substack.com/ Also The Pragmatic Engineer: https://newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/

+++ to Bernard/The Kaka, and go Kiwis.

Oh also Webworm by David Farrier is really good too https://www.webworm.co/

Better for international audiences, if you like Dax Shepard's podcast with him, you'll love his Webworm content.

Re: We’re the founders of Substack, we just launched an iOS app. AUA

#104

Post by ubac »

cjbest wrote: post #98
vosper wrote: post #46

Will there ever be bundles? Or some kind of bulk discount? Pay-per-article? I'm a paid subscriber to a number of Substack writers, and I'd like to subscribe to more, but it can rapidly run into the hundreds of dollars per month - so I really have to pick and choose. I can imagine bundles aren't really your model, and maybe aren't in your authors interest either. But I'd love to get like an Economics bundle and a New…

Thank you for subscribing! The bundle question is interesting. The model right now is really an unbundling. The direct relationship between writers and readers is what makes Substack work: as a writer, your incentive is to earn and keep the trust of the audience who deeply values your work. That's not just a good way to get paid for work you're already doing. It's a model that allows and rewards a fundamentally diffe…

Chris can we get a promise in writing from you that you will never implement bundles in such a way that writers couldn't leave your platform and take 100% of their paying subscribers with them?

Re: We’re the founders of Substack, we just launched an iOS app. AUA

#105

Post by bdougherty »

rileymat2 wrote: post #94
Ologn wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A popular sentiment on HN is "don't make an app when you can just have a web page". I have yet to hear a user data analytics team say that.

To clarify, for the good of the user or for their own purposes?

Not OP, but of course it is for their own purposes.

Re: We’re the founders of Substack, we just launched an iOS app. AUA

#106

Post by sachinmonga »

wildbirds wrote: post #60

I noticed some of the magic of Cocoon when I started up the Substack app. While I hate to see Cocoon get neglected (please keep it alive!), I do love to see the Substack app so well designed. It's a pleasure to use. Well done! Have you ever considered offering subscription packages? I find it hard to justify making multiple paid subscriptions (they add up fast), but would love to be able to build a package of newslet…

Aww, thank you for the kind words. It was fun to get to sneak in some of the Cocoon design patterns here and there throughout the Substack app :)

Bundles of some kind are an often-requested feature by both writers and readers. Something we're really mindful of: the direct connection between reader and writer is the magic that makes the whole Substack model work. So we would be very wary of a bundle product that abstracted that connection. However, I do think there are ways to do a bundle that keep that direct connection front and center, keeping the reader in control, and maintaining the writer's ownership of their audience. It's an interesting problem to think about!

Re: We’re the founders of Substack, we just launched an iOS app. AUA

#109

Post by Meekro »

NationalPark wrote: post #74
Meekro wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Censorship happens when a writer is de-platformed, and has nowhere to turn to re-platform themselves. People on HN then give snarky, insincere advice about creating your own web hosting company or whatever. On the other hand, there are lots of platforms catering to nudity and sexual content, so I don't think this is going to be a problem there. In a society where the government isn't allowed to censor, the greatest f…

You're only saying that censorship isn't a problem for content that you personally judge to be unimportant. Many don't see it that way - they see policies like this as evidence of Substack appeasing Christian moralist values that have "cancelled" the expression of sexuality and sexual identity outside of a set of norms acceptable to them. Worse, these "blanket" policies often only end up enforced against LGBTQ people…

I guess you're right that I'm less upset about pornography because I'm not a consumer of it. But let me give you my best attempt at a principled answer, too..

I'd say that porn producers have lots of places to go that will cater to them, and that will connect them to porn consumers. As I recall, reddit's r/gonewild is huge, and lots of producers are using it to pull people to their OnlyFans accounts. Someone who is "canceled" for porn at Substack could just go there, and they'd probably be better off because they'd be in a community of people who want to consume porn.

On the other hand, an anti-vax writer (or someone who was publishing accurate concerns about the covid vaccines and was labeled "anti-vax") couldn't just go get a job at Fox to continue their activities after Facebook banned them and their web host stopped hosting them, etc.

Bottom line, I think it's reasonable for a "free speech" platform to specialize in certain kinds of unpopular speech so that they don't have to fight every censor-happy asshole at once. One might say "we specialize in hosting porn and fighting Christian censors" and another might say "we specialize in hosting Trumpers and anti-vaxxers and fighting woke censors" and that's perfectly fine. Ideally, there would be enough such platforms in existence that a writer could choose the proper one for the kind of content they plan to create.

Re: We’re the founders of Substack, we just launched an iOS app. AUA

#110

Post by cjbest »

hihihihi1234 wrote: post #91

When am I going to be able to add strikethrough text, superscripts and subscripts to my Substack posts?

We do have strikethrough! It's the little S with the line through it in the editor bar (or Cmd+shft+X)

Good thought on subscripts.

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