Ask HN: Why is Substack so popular? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Why is Substack so popular?

#21

Post by beaconstudios » Tue, Apr 19, 2022, 2:36 PM UTC

gruez wrote: post #14

boplicity wrote: post #11

1. They've astroturfed a lot. (By paying famous people to use their service.) This has given them a lot of credibility. 2. They basically solve the business model issue for writers, so you really can focus on the writing. At least, more so than the alternatives. 3. Their design is actually pretty nice, and focused on just two things: list building and content. 4. The defaults make sense, and solve real problems for p…

> 1. They've astroturfed a lot. (By paying famous people to use their service.) This has given them a lot of credibility. Paying for what is essentially celebrity endorsements seems like the exact opposite of "astorturfed".

I understand what they meant though: paying celebrities to join while giving people the impression that those celebrities joined by free choice* (ie because the platform was so great).

* edit: free choice as in "not swayed by payment"

Re: Ask HN: Why is Substack so popular?

#22

Post by keiferski » Tue, Apr 19, 2022, 2:36 PM UTC

Their success reminds me a lot of Slack. They did a simple thing, but they did it really well. That seems to be an underrated strategy for startups.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Substack so popular?

#23

Post by skybrian » Tue, Apr 19, 2022, 2:37 PM UTC

gruez wrote: post #14

boplicity wrote: post #11

1. They've astroturfed a lot. (By paying famous people to use their service.) This has given them a lot of credibility. 2. They basically solve the business model issue for writers, so you really can focus on the writing. At least, more so than the alternatives. 3. Their design is actually pretty nice, and focused on just two things: list building and content. 4. The defaults make sense, and solve real problems for p…

> 1. They've astroturfed a lot. (By paying famous people to use their service.) This has given them a lot of credibility. Paying for what is essentially celebrity endorsements seems like the exact opposite of "astorturfed".

Although they are minor celebrities, it's not quite celebrity endorsement either. More like a book advance. They expect to make the money back from the author's own subscriptions.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Substack so popular?

#24

Post by danielktdoranie » Tue, Apr 19, 2022, 2:37 PM UTC

I think the reason Substack is so popular is they value Freedom of Speech and it shows in their actions.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Substack so popular?

#25

Post by jasode » Tue, Apr 19, 2022, 2:37 PM UTC

>Does it have some kind of a hidden feature that makes it very appealing? My number one assumption would be that it uses a global userbase, so people who write on Substack can collect subscribers/readers much faster.

Substack has a different financial incentive structure that attracts writers away from alternatives such as Medium.com or hosted WordPress:

- monetization is easy to go from "free" to "paid newsletters". The pricing is set by the author and the revenue isn't shared with other writers

- for paid subscriptions, the writer has the subscribers' email addresses for a more direct relationship

In contrast, Medium does not reveal email addresses and does a revenue share of a flat $50 subscription price.

Looked at a certain way, Substack replaces MailChimp (an email audience relationship tool) more so than Medium.

The founder of Substack gave an interview and he said that Substack is a SaaS backoffice of Ben Thompson's "Stratechery" paid newsletter. Ben was one of the early pioneers of the paid email newsletters resurgence but since Substack didn't exist, he had to string together the payments and emails logistics himself. The later writers wanting to get paid for newsletters can just use Substack instead of reinventing Ben's tech stack.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Substack so popular?

#26

Post by deltarholamda » Tue, Apr 19, 2022, 2:39 PM UTC

boplicity wrote: post #11

1. They've astroturfed a lot. (By paying famous people to use their service.) This has given them a lot of credibility. 2. They basically solve the business model issue for writers, so you really can focus on the writing. At least, more so than the alternatives. 3. Their design is actually pretty nice, and focused on just two things: list building and content. 4. The defaults make sense, and solve real problems for p…

2,3,4 are the technical answers, and I agree with them. If you're a writer, you can try to build some kind of a mix of Facebook/Twitter clout for your self-hosted blog (with all of the technical pains that entails), or you can try to get hired at lower-class wages by a print publication.

Substack is a better solution for this, and it includes the mailing list building features that make it a superior solution to the social media treadmill.

1 is a marketing ploy, and while "astroturfing" sounds bad, it's fairly accurate and also a really good idea for what is a pretty niche market.

All that said, I wish it wasn't this way. Siloing Internet content, even if the operation was an open, squeaky-clean, First Amendment-loving angel, is antithetical to the Internet ethos. And based on extensive experience, even the angelic operations eventually become not-so-angelic.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Substack so popular?

#27

Post by neural_thing » Tue, Apr 19, 2022, 2:40 PM UTC

nonameiguess wrote: post #17

There are two questions here, really. The first is why does Substack appeal to readers? To me, it doesn't. What appeals to me are the writers. If I care to read what they write, I'd read it on any platform. They happen to be on Substack, so I read them on Substack. The other question is why does it appeal to writers, in particular the more popular high-quality, high-prestige writers that are attracting readers? I don…

I work at Substack. We are building https://reader.substack.com/ for people who prefer pull. Supports both Substack and RSS. Still early days for that product but we are investing in it.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Substack so popular?

#28

Post by hall0ween » Tue, Apr 19, 2022, 2:40 PM UTC

tharne wrote: post #4

They are very pro free speech, so you tend to get more interesting (and potentially more heretical) writers compared to other platforms.

Could you provide a link or two of content that might be censored elsewhere? I am curious to read “banned literature”.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Substack so popular?

#29

Post by Hayvok » Tue, Apr 19, 2022, 2:41 PM UTC

My list as a reader -

  - No ads, popups, random paywalls.
  - Authors looking for paid subs offer quite a bit of free content.
  - Substack feels like it loads faster than Medium. Very snappy.
  - Simple email sub/unsub.
  - Substack doesn't treat me like a child & decide some ideas are too dangerous for me to read about.
  - I don't worry that an article/newsletter I like (or dislike!) will suddenly disappear off the internet.

Re: Ask HN: Why is Substack so popular?

#30

Post by skybrian » Tue, Apr 19, 2022, 2:41 PM UTC

beaconstudios wrote: post #21

gruez wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1. They've astroturfed a lot. (By paying famous people to use their service.) This has given them a lot of credibility. Paying for what is essentially celebrity endorsements seems like the exact opposite of "astorturfed".

I understand what they meant though: paying celebrities to join while giving people the impression that those celebrities joined by free choice* (ie because the platform was so great). * edit: free choice as in "not swayed by payment"

They signed a contract of their own free choice because it was a good deal for them. This isn't hidden. There's no reason to hide it any more than a musician would hide getting signed by a record label.