Keep up the good work...And...please do away with this new Substack issuance of the "influencer" checkmark. It doesn't reflect well on Substack to fall into Meta/X mimicking. Readers love and follow the writers they respect, not because of perceived "being in the special club."
I tend to agree with that. Some of us will be more widely read than others, but this just creates a class-based hierarchy that is bound to hurt the writers who are still struggling to be discovered to the benefit of those who have already been discovered.
Would agree to this thread. At some point every platform works with some kind of biases and some sort of insensitivity. Still I appreciate at least there were sensible words. I am still trying to find my footing here and badges do create discrimination.
Exactly, for many of us writers starting from scratch, the algorithm is everything. It was designed and built by the people who run the platform to do what they chose for it to do. To then act like it's just an uncontrollable but cute house pet that will do what it feels like doing is just silly.
The algorithm can be changed at any time by leadership; it can reward or discourage whatever behaviors or content they want.
Same as the choice whether or not to have badges. Another decision actively made and not just chance.
That's probably true. I think people who read as a hobby tend to be more educated and more well-off. My early impression of Substack was that it was drawing writers who, 25 years ago, might have been writing for middlebrow and highbrow magazines like The Atlantic and The New York Review of Books.
I have enjoyed the Substack community; it has a special good "feel" to it. Imagine my surprise when after unsubscribing from a really good newsletter here and receiving notifications from it that I was unsubscribed, a few days later I received a new edition of it from a different community called Beehiiv! How is that possible? I unsubscribed from that source also and have yet to hear back from them. Beehiiv seems a very different kind of host to writers and one I'm not comfortable with. Can a platform force you to stay subscribed?
Some folks publish in two places and transfer their subscribers from one to another. It's unlikely they want to force you to stay subscribed. More likely is that the authors don't sync their subscriber lists between one platform and the other. After unsubbing from Beehiv, you should be good to go.
I've tried, but they haven't replied! It looks like the writer sent a list of his subscribers to Beehiiv with my name on it, even though I had already unsubscribed from him.
Chris speaks of imagining and I think that's great. Now let's imagine a platform that doesn't take advantage of people's tendency to be swayed by what others think.
Badges: You should like this because other people are paying for it.
Most popular post list: You should like this because other people liked it.
More than X subscribers: you should like this because... well you get the idea.
Imagine a platform that enabled you to find what you want and didn't try to sway your choices in this way. Imagine a platform that prized people making up their own mind above so-called social proof.
I actually feel like Reddit ticks a lot of these boxes. Ignoring all the issues Reddit has, the one thing I‘ve always respected about the platform is how there, the content is in focus. If you‘re interested in a certain topic you‘ll subscribe to it and get shown popular posts. Of course there you still have the „you should like this because others did too“ But I think when it comes to that kind of scale (and let‘s be honest, also quality) of content, this is inevitable. But also, this algorithm is very basic, only serving you what other‘s liked, not basing anything on your personal preferences. If you and I subscribe to the exact same Subreddits we can expect to be shown the exact same posts.
Indeed, and I'm at times on the lookout for a recommendation. A tree surgeon, a carpenter, a brick layer... I go to friends and see if they know somebody because I don't want to pick out someone randomly.
Just fyi the checkmarks are to illustrate the number of paying subscribers (hollow orange for hundreds; solid orange for thousands; blue for tens of thousands), so they’re less a social credit system as on X and Facebook, but more a signal to readers that this or that publication has managed to attract a given number of paying subs. Obviously I have one, so you may think me biased, but it’s nice to have a system which automatically shows new subs that your work is of sufficient quality to merit paying for. Keeps the flywheel spinning.
Wouldn't it be helpful to also have a checkmark for those of use who are just starting to accrue paying subscribers to at least signal to readers "Hey here's some work to keep an eye on."?
Yes! I just started and have two out-of-nowhere pledges. It's mind-blowing... but if you search for me, even using my substack's exact name, I'm way down the list, with checkmarkers above me.
And this is where the bias comes into play when using algorithms. Not a big fan of their use in any app unless they are built to be equitable and not built to enhance a company's bottom line, which if we are going to be 100% honest here, that's exactly what the checkmarks are built for. By promoting Substackers with large subscriber bases it also promotes Substack's own revenue stream. I'm fine with them making money but be honest, don't use false virtue signalling by saying the checkmarks are a way of showing quality while not mentioning the strong marketing aspect behind them. Substack should be better than that.
Yeah, I know all the platforms seem to be doing away with the reverse chronological recent post search results and hashtags, but I always thought that approach was very fair. Everyone got an equal opportunity to be seen by people looking for that kind of thing.
Just because a site has an orange or purple checkmark, doesn't mean you have to sign up for it. You can go there and look at it out of curiosity, but no one says you have to follow them if it's not your cup of tea.
Congrats! That's amazing. I turned off Pledges almost immediately because I was worried people would get confused as to what they were and think that I was asking for money.
Yeah, I was worried about that, but then I thought... you never know. I mean, clearly, two pledges, you never know. So I decided that my approach would be to not include any upgrade-subscription prompts anywhere except at the very, very bottom after I've already signed off, and I led with a "looking for more?" kind of spiel, and then I explained that "my newsletter is and always will be free (substack is supplementary to my primary writing, not my primary writing), but if you're looking for more, make a pledge and I'll see what I can do." And I wrote it in third person, which I think helped distance me from the ask, like it was substack doing it, not so much me. Anyway. Apparently it's not turning anyone off, and it's even enticing a couple people. So you might consider turning it back on. Hope this helps!
I think part of the reason for me was also the fact that this is a side hobby (albeit one I'd love to turn serious at some stage), so it didn't feel necessary to have pledges. But, maybe you're right and maybe I will consider at some stage toggling that switch back on.
A couple of years ago, I was invited to Substack Grow. The criteria was people who had at least a 40% read rate. (There may have been other criteria, but that’s the one I remember.) There could be something like that? To signal that the people who DO subscribe like it enough to read it regularly? I’m not sure.
What I did learn from Grow is that people who write about cooking or travel or technology seem to have the “secret” on how to grow audiences. But the Grow folks didn’t feature anyone who was not already popular who grew big writing think pieces. What amuses me is there’s not even a category on this app for complicated think pieces. We don’t exist in Substack’s eyes. People are talking about checks and I’d just like a category.
A new-comer badge, or even customisable badges might be a cool thing to have. It could be a bit of cosmetic fun if there wasn't any status attached to it.
I have 15,000 subscribers on Substack and zero ticks, checks, or whatever we're calling them. My subscribers are all interested in me and my work. I don't actively TRY to monetize them so most of my subscribers are free. I will in the next few months but I wanted to take it slow the first year on Substack and attract them to my work here before actively monetizing. But this doesn't invalidate the fact that I still have a solid subscriber base with over 75% reading each post I publish. This is where the ticks/checks don't really help ALL of us.
Maybe they should have badges for number of overall subscribers too? I suppose they already do list the number when they first visit a publication, or a profile on Notes, but it would be cool if there was also a more visual thing for overall numbers too
Mikey, understand totally ... also, putting my tiny hand up for the folk who genuinely don't want to have paying (or pledged) subscribers (just saying so for a me) - the playing field should level(ish) or at least not two escalators, one fast, one slow (rubbish analogy alert, which is one reason I won't charge for my musings!)
I think Substack do a pretty good job of keeping a level playing field overall. We all have access to the same tools. Substack Reads and getting featured on the homepage is not dependent on checkmarks (both happened to me before I got mine).
A more philosophical point - I have a strong belief that power laws are a fact of the universe, however we may feel about them, so I’m not sure there’s anything Substack, or any platform, could do to stop big winners arising from the mass of strivers. Not that all of us are even seeking to be the big winners, of course. Creating is worth doing for its own sake, regardless of following or monetary reward.
Philosophically speaking, it all depends how we measure winning ... as comparison is the thief of joy I am mightily of the hope that we all find some voices we enjoy hearing, and that we all end up being voices that find an audience of their own, whatever the size.
I would gently say, though, that as "a discovery system that attempts to maximize subscription revenue for writers" rolls out, the pitch leans a little more in favour of those in that space.
I'm very relaxed though, relishing the joy of creation.
You make a very good point, Barrie. Though I’m not sure what the alternative for Substack is, as they will need to earn money at some point. I have no idea but I doubt they’ve made a profit yet, given the Silicon Valley tech startup playbook
Of course, so true - and I guess the big hitters will end up supporting the business model and those with smaller reach (and modest ambitions).
There's an excellent recent post by Margaret Atwood which addresses the idea of taking paid subscriptions, dispersing the 10% to Substack before supporting charities with the rest. Lots of ways to flavour the recipe.
Understood and your point is well-taken. But the very fact of having checkmarks creates hierarchy, a distinction between you, who have one, and me, who does not. In the eye of a casual reader, they may not understand that nothing more is meant by it than what you say.
Before I've reached 100 paying subs here, I wasn't getting a single new free subscriber from substack's platform, after reaching it, it started to grab people's attention— it's easy to gloss over publications such as ours 'cause like you I only have ~1000 total subs— yet pound-per-pound, we're deliving a product worth paying for, at least for the members of our audience, and that in itself can be intriguing for the potential reader.
Funny thing— here's the origin story— I was nicknamed Potato when I was 6yrs old because I had a T-shirt of Benny The Ball from Top Cat, here in Brazil his name was translated to "Batatinha" which means Small Potato in portuguese— now, 30 years later, my 18yo daughter's friends call me the equivalent to "Mr. Potato" HAHAHA
The problem with the “managed to attract paying subs” characterization is that, unlike you (the hardest working person on Substack) a lot of people come with a national profile of some sort, and built-in followers. Now, those people often bring new readers with them, and at least one of those previously popular writers recommended me, which boosted me for a month, for which I was grateful. (And I’ve managed to keep those new subscribers.) But I can see how when people are struggling to attract readers, the checks from the “popular club” can be disheartening. Also, most writers are not marketers. That is a needed skill to gain headway.
Well that’s very kind of you to say so, thank you. I can understand the frustration, but those people with built in followers didn’t get given those followers, they had to build them up over years too, albeit somewhere else. It takes insane patience but imho over a long enough timeline, anyone writing quality work with a consistent schedule will get there.
We have a way to fix all of this and more. We need to make new systems that make the old ones obsolete - or in this case plug into their old systems and fix them with decentralization and transparency. Understanding this takes a little effort and it starts by using Human Swarm Intelligence to harness the Wisdom of the Crowd. For short, it is called "swarming." Scientists and medical fields looking to form decentralized systems need to be part of this. Start your journey here and stay tuned:
I too notice that SubStack doesn't deliver me fresh new reads within easy reach. I have to go out and actively search for them. The Explore suggestions feel clunky, impersonal, and hard to scroll through and gauge. It's either brand new publications that are 7 days old, or the big boys, and they feel like random suggestions -- they rarely match my interests or tastes, but they're also not challenging or stimulating as you suggest.
I have to assume that this also means that our publications are not being suggested to others once we're no longer new and exciting, or a big boy.
And even the content I’ve previously said “not interested” in, I’d like to have shown again a few months or so later. After all, tastes, interests and opinions change. 🙃
The only thing I REALLY hope happens here is that Substack could maybe pick a random newbie who IS NOT famous and announce their presence here lol. Elizabeth Gilbert didn't need an announcement...she showed up with her own million people in her pocket 😂
I just hope algorithms never put celebrities in front of me. I can find those on my own. Give me the regular folk who are writing amazing things.
Have you ever been a writer on Medium? I've been over there for years so I've sprinkled some links in my Medium posts.
Otherwise, commenting (like you're already doing) has worked wonders for me. I subscribe to lots of other Substacks and really engage in their comments and communities.
At the risk of commenting here instead of over there :) great article! I too miss those old days and it really was like small towns we were building. Substack so far seems to be the closest thing I’ve found to replicating that feeling.
I was deciding where to put my effort between Substack and Medium when I began my project and went with this one because it feels more vibrant with a larger community.
I will say it IS more vibrant and intimate here but Medium itself has such a high page rank that it's a great springboard for other endeavors. But if you're a newbie on Medium it's difficult to get noticed. You could always cross-post your stuff from here onto Medium and link back to here. Lots of Medium writers have moved here and do the cross-posting thing.
I didn't know her before she got here, so it was a non-event for me. I had to look her up to figure out who she was, and it's still a non-event for me.
Well, when I first posted a Note, it was to announce the debut of my blog here. Someone from Substack liked and restacked it… and no one else seemed to give a damn. Just saying….
True. I’d like that as well. And though I like Elizabeth Gilbert and have enjoyed a few of her books, the focus of her substack isn’t really something I’m interested in right now so it’d be nice to find other writers who ARE writing content that I’m interested in right now.
I’m really excited to see that there’s a new version of the app coming out. There’s so much potential here. Looking forward to seeing where it all goes! Proud to be a writer on substack, a place that seems far more in alignment with my values.
I wish you guys would build a better and more robust search engine for Substack and our own posts e.g. I struggle to find stocks that I know I have written about in previous posts with the current search engine...
Agree on comments regarding search engine improvement. How difficult would it be to be able to search key words with a time sort function (that would show ALL results based upon post date - not how successful that writer already is or what SS thinks one SHOULD read). No other interface/algorithm needed. People can choose to use this feature or not. People can decide on their own if they want to read or not. This really is not rocket science....shows this matter is more about control, not content, nor individual free will.
I would love to be able to search for writers by more niche categories and keywords. It would help to build community around the niche topics I write about (food allergies, Judaism, and wildlife conservation). Beyond that, I know there are many writers on Substack who write about unusual topics, and I’d be keen to have a way to find them and uncover a new potential interest.
ITS hugely annoying in my case because I always link the stock name to the IR page and ALL the tickers from major exchanges when the primary listing is not the NYSE-NASDAQ... So I have look up the tickers on Google finance, link them to the Yahoo! Finance quote, hunt for the IR page (no always easy if the stock's website is not in English and I have to use the browser translator...) etc. I hate doing work I have already done over again when I should be able to just quickly search for a previous post where the stock was mentioned and cut and paste...
Oh yea, they need to make the tag feature easier to use for old posts e.g. its easy to recategorize or retag old posts in Wordpress at the back end. Substack nictitates you to open individual posts, tag them, and resave them with a date error often happening on the first save attempt....
I am using the tag feature for some posts and its very useful. I did mention to Linda they should do a cloud or something as tags start to clutter the front page e.g. see https://emergingmarketskeptic.substack.com/ on a desktop-laptop computer for where and how I have organized the tags...
Agree! Discovery could be as easy as allowing writers to categorize their own content or search by tags. It would give readers full control while preventing all the pitfalls that come with algorithms.
"We are not against algorithms. We’ll enthusiastically use algorithms, or AI, or any other technology we can get our hands on, as long as we can use them to serve the human ends that we care about. For readers, that means letting you decide what you read as the best version of yourself—helping you take back your mind."
I am very vehemently against algorithms or any kind of "curation" I am not 100% in complete control off. I really hope I am not reading too much in between the lines here.
Algorithms inherently strip humans of their agency. That's literally their purpose. They are designed to specifically say to users, "Look at this, but not that. Think about this, but not that. This is what's popular, not that. You'll like this. Trust me."
In high school, I used to sit for hours on MySpace listening to every band that self-listed their music under all the genre categories I liked. This was before algorithms. Follower counts were an afterthought. It was all 100% organic. Finding good musicians felt like I'd won the lottery. I did the same on Livejournal. Finding good writers and artists there was like scoring the jackpot.
I found so many quality creatives back then that I'm certain today's algorithms would overlook due to their less commercial sounds or more unique worldviews. As algorithms slowly took over, many of those creatives disappeared into the digital void -- or otherwise joined the ranks of homogeny to maintain their status online. Algorithms don't like outliers. They require us to fall into line if we want to be heard or seen.
I don't know why we can't just go back to no algorithms. I'm assuming it has something to do with dollars and levels of control that aren't obvious to us from the outside.
I'm also uncomfortable with an algorithm dictating what it thinks the "best version" of me should look like. That's scary language. No technology in the world knows the best version of myself better than me.
"Algorithms don't like outliers." Wow! Exactly! You've perfectly described the essence of what I've been trying to articulate for the last hour! Thank you!
Awh yay I'm glad!! I've noticed this for years (I was even interviewed by a national photography magazine a few years ago about my opinions on the homogeny of social media -- of course it was published in print, haha, go figure!)
I honestly don't think algorithms would have boosted many of humanity's most cherished writers and musicians and artists and journalists of the past. What those people were doing and saying was far too innovative and unique to get promoted by an algorithm -- and often even subversive to the status quo of their time. An algorithm would have overlooked them, or possibly even demoted their visibility, based on the exact same qualities that humans today celebrate them for.
I agree! What's interesting to me is that all human art is a form of communication -- it expresses a particular human's experience and existence in a specific time and place. Every piece of human-made art is a piece of human history, and a testament to our collective history.
Today, AI takes all of those historical human experiences and statements, renders them meaningless, jumbles and reassembles them like some kind of artistic Frankenstein, and then pops out whatever visual qualities someone asked for on command.
I suppose that, in itself, is a testament to our current time and place -- but what a sad and empty time it is. Will the art of the future simply be a machine following orders? It's dismal to think about.
You have nailed it in the head. It is built with imitation as a foundation. In its current incarnation, there is little room for originality. The patterns from each model become more evident the more each model is used. Aesthetically the output is akin to 1996 clipart with 2023 pixel density.
I too felt uncomfortable with that choice of words. Yet that may well have been the most accurate, best worded expression of where this is really going.
Yeah, one of the issues that I have is the assumption that they can control things better than others have in the past. That it won’t just go off the rails like everything else. It’s incredibly presumptuous of them.
I am extremely skeptical about this. Not because I don't believe in the team here, but because I have also seen way too many times already where the path always ends.
Me too. Everyone who tries it assumes that they have the magic knowledge that will solve the whole problem of the internet. They all end up in a terrible place. This is why I have diversified where my Substack content is. Because I don’t want to presume that they will do everything correctly and I won’t end up in a worse place.
I don't consider myself old but I do consider myself sick and tired of others pointing me toward what I should and should not consume. I genuinely hope that is not what will be going on here.
I agree. Medium platform does this and it is confining for me as a reader to wade through to reach and explore what I'd like to pursue on my own. They undulate me with emails to suggest "what I might like." Curation be damned.
You could read that as someone else deciding what is the best version of ourselves, which hopefully isn't the case.
Or it could be read as using our purposeful selection of reading to predict which general categories we aren't interested in, thereby preventing us from wading through large quantities of what we don't want in the explore areas. That saves time and frustration. Scrolling really changes when personal preferences, or categories of interest are completely turned off.
I actually don't mind tons of reading in varied subjects. I used to do that in the early days of social media, before algorithms, and it helped me discover a lot of creative people that I never would have discovered today with the "help" of algorithms.
One thing (of many) that I dislike about algorithms is the illusion of choice that they create. I would rather just do the hard work of reading a lot myself -- the way humans used to do back when they went to libraries and bookstores and read magazines and newspapers made of paper.
Whenever you give sex, age, and preferences on an app, you are setting algorithms.
I cleared a old smartphone and downloaded the tiktok app for an experience of a sort of pre-algorithm searching. I gave minimum to no preference, and demographic data, and the wrong (adult) age, to obtain the most un-algorithmic experience for awhile. Tiktok was like an alien world. Age is really big for algorithms. Rather than buying smart phone insurance we always used old phones for backup. I had several wrong age accounts to see how it changes such things as the news feeds and what is promoted in email.
I'm interested in just about anything, but I would like the algorithms to leave out porn, most hollywood and celebrity stuff, and long (TMI) discussions about the activities of personal hygiene. That saves scroll time.
An active search function is different, and should bring up what your words ask for, based direct relevance as much as possible. That's why I use alternative search engines to Bing, Google, Yahoo, etc.
Yes, I noticed that too! When the pandemic started, I made a Twitter account to keep up with breaking news. I didn't enter any of my demographic info because I just planned to use it like an RSS feed. Once everything got politicized, which happened shockingly fast, I made a point to follow equal numbers of people on the left and right to balance the information I was seeing.
It was insane -- what I saw was evidence that people on all sides were being fed different lies and half-truths while being led to believe their side was the right one. It was really sad, and it was even more sad that Twitter's leadership was actively leaning into it and fueling divisions, rather than fixing the algorithm and giving users access to balanced information.
I also noticed similar phenomenon to what you described with TikTok during the two hours I had an account before deleting it in total disgust, haha.
Algorithms are no joke. They can be really harmful. I'm skeptical that there's any way to make them work for humans, even under leadership that has the very best of intentions.
I have a Twitter account, but once they stuck a fork in SubStack, I'm not trying to grow the Twit presence. Why bother? Twitter banned a lot of people, including data analysts who came up with "wrong" conclusions, by merely graphing publicly accessible info. Some journalists who gazed upon "The Twitter Files" and wrote about the ties between Twitter and government are now at SubStack, in some cases after they were kicked out by prior employers. Interestingly, in July, a federal court has ordered the U.S. executive branch of government to cease and desist its activities to influence the content of social media.
I agree! And yes -- I'm so glad there are people defending public access to information using the legal system. What those lawsuits are doing is incredibly important. The outcomes of those lawsuits will reveal whether there is anything that sets America apart from authoritarian regimes.
I also think it would be wise for American lawyers to start challenging what constitutes "good faith" content moderation (as required under Section 230) -- because in my opinion, what I saw happen on Twitter during the pandemic, with the manipulation of algorithms and the stifling or amplification of different information for users of different demographics, was not done in good faith.
Correct. I am specifically referring to gatekeeping by the platform under the veil of "curation" where certain authors or articles are artificially surfaced based on arbitrary metrics. Anything that comes between me and the author of the work is unnecessary.
If it were yours to do, how would you encourage discovery without using curation as a starting point?
(Are you on Tumblr, btw? The pinnacle of social media that, at least historically, has one of the least top-down curated social experiences on the planet? ;-) )
I think taking people you follow and posts you like or restack as a starting point can lead to good results. I'm just not sure why some algorithms do a good job of this and some don't. For example, Spotify pretty consistently suggests music that I like by musicians I've often never heard of, while Netflix is more like "You gave a thumbs-up to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, so we thought you might like High School Hot Tub."
I follow my own curiosity for discovery. Depending on the topic, I like to have free rein on how shallow or how deep I want to go. But if as a hypothetical my job description required me to contaminate the pool, I would start by putting a handicap on reach to make sure the playing field is equalized and everyone gets a fair shot. Then, I would employ a community based up/down voting system to determine what stays on top.
Yeah the handicap is key to ensure the oxygen isn't constantly sucked out of the room by the ones with the most followers. This becomes increasingly important as the platform matures and the gap between those who've been at it for a while and those who are just starting out widens.
As far as curiosity, my life mostly revolves around travel, so I usually pursue things that are informed by my interactions with others and IRL experiences. I am fascinated by exploring how others live and typically spend a lot of time talking to others. My life online is merely an extension of that.
I think Reddit though not perfect, has found a decent balance when it comes to up/down voting. The community in most subs is also very good at calling out others that are blatantly trying to horde attention.
Very much so. There are great authors from all walks of life here, yet there seems to be a not so subtle bias towards the low hanging fruit that can bring in the most revenue with the least amount of effort. The paragraph I quoted above just reeked of this in between the lines.
Yes. There is enough of that already out there and it is precisely what has contaminated so many other platforms to the point they are pretty much useless for anything other than dopamine hits.
I mean, you say this and I want to believe you, but... even though I'm not (and don't plan to)monetize my writing here, even though my whole reason for being here is to get away from that, my "notes" feed is still filled with "how I made a zillion dollars on substack" articles that I've never clicked on and have no interest in.
I can only conclude that since substack only makes money when writers are successful at monetizing their publications, this is the algorithm priotizing the needs of the owners over what I'm here for.
So you know, there is that... (said with all affection -- I'm happy to be here, but those articles and the relentless focus on money money money is troubling and a bit of a sour note in all of it...)
Those Note’s feeds are laughable and annoying. You have to scroll for ten minutes before hitting any posts related to you by some degree. My favorite is when the feed just loops through all the same people, all with check marks, none having any association with me.
The loop is so strange. Same stuff coming back around, and yet I’ve been here for over two months and can’t get any traction in Notes for the life of me (unless I comment on any of the 10 writers showing up in my loop, lol).
I think the only way to be successful at Notes is to engage with others whenever you post a note, but it has to be with the right people, where your comments will be seen and responded to, i.e., talk to the popular kids. This will get your note circulating in their feeds. Still, it means nothing if those writers don't engage with what you post, and many of them won't. I find Notes very frustrating. I wish I had never wasted my time trying it, as I promised I wouldn't. I don't bother anymore.
I do believe you've nailed it. The problem with Notes is that it's all about finding writers who are good at... posting notes. That is, those who play the game which has as its #1 rule is that you must pretend it isn't a game.
I've had a few interesting exchanges on Notes, and that's great. But it seems to be way more about the popular folks sitting around patting each other on the back, and the not so popular tapping the door in the hope to be noticed.
And there you have it, as you said Corey. The inner circle expands but it's less about the person's work that yields the mutual support, and more about the social personality that one can display.
That's my take anyway. Same dynamic as writers on Twitter.
I can't vouch for Twitter. My only other social media experience is a brief stint on LinkedIn, which I think works very similar to Notes. The more you engage with others the more your notes will circulate, and the more chance you have of reaching more people. Notes seem more limited, though. I know it's a nook compared to other platforms, but to see the same ten people at the top of my feed whenever I go on is irksome. Like you said, it is a game, like any other social platform. If you really want to expand your audience using Notes and the like, you must talk to people you wouldn't normally talk to and pretend they're as awesome as they think they are.
I restack posts sometimes, mine and others, and then always wonder what I was thinking because I know nobody saw it. I don't have the time right now to spend three hours patting backs just to get some views, nor do I care to.
This is really heartening to read! So many of us (both writers on Substack and readers) are trying to do intentional work to curate our experience and what we take in each day, yet (of course) find ourselves derailed by the inherent algorithmic realities that push us in various directions. (And some of us write a lot about it to help others!😆)
I’m really excited about this - and I think as with anything else, it’s knowing what we don’t know that gives us the agency to actually learn. This sounds like an amazing way for people to experience the shift in their own reading/algorithm experience, and then see how drastic and empowering a different way could be. Here for it! ✏️💙
The flywheel of Substack is accelerating as the quantity of quality writing takes off. In the spirit of challenging convictions and understanding the why, hosting debates between prominent authors with differing perspectives could be a huge draw for Substack. Here are a few matchups I'd love to see: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/great-substack-debates-matchups
One of my favorite things to do when I was in college, twenty years ago, was to look up debates that challenged the very core of what I believed in. And I'd just lie down and listen to them, for days on end. It was so refreshing and never antagonistic—just me, the CD, and the screen. I love the idea of Substack putting that sort of constructive content that challenges one's thinking in front of us. Not to get us to rage engage, but to expand our thinking.
I just joined the Substack community, changing from a blog to Substack. I found you just as you suggest, by receiving messages that intrigue me. Thank you.
Me too. I joined Substack about a year ago because all the writers I liked best were here. This community is so much more in my zone -- writing not to sell another product but for the love of writing and sharing with others.
I felt the same way. It’s a bit of feel good jargon. At the same time, I’m enjoying what Substack is doing (generally) and I have a vague sense of excitement for the thing coming that I can’t discern 😆
Algorithm for quality? Really? What a horrendous thought. Turing will be turning over in his grave. It's the human intelllect that creates, not machines. Substack, turn back before it's too late!
Keep up the good work...And...please do away with this new Substack issuance of the "influencer" checkmark. It doesn't reflect well on Substack to fall into Meta/X mimicking. Readers love and follow the writers they respect, not because of perceived "being in the special club."
I tend to agree with that. Some of us will be more widely read than others, but this just creates a class-based hierarchy that is bound to hurt the writers who are still struggling to be discovered to the benefit of those who have already been discovered.
Appreciating this thread. Thank you.
Regarding class, also: I wonder whether if the pub theme itself attracts readers with more means to attract paying readers. Just a thought.
Would agree to this thread. At some point every platform works with some kind of biases and some sort of insensitivity. Still I appreciate at least there were sensible words. I am still trying to find my footing here and badges do create discrimination.
We don't need no stinking badges!
Exactly, for many of us writers starting from scratch, the algorithm is everything. It was designed and built by the people who run the platform to do what they chose for it to do. To then act like it's just an uncontrollable but cute house pet that will do what it feels like doing is just silly.
The algorithm can be changed at any time by leadership; it can reward or discourage whatever behaviors or content they want.
Same as the choice whether or not to have badges. Another decision actively made and not just chance.
Yes 🙌🏻 amidst the positive vibes we still have a parallel AI world to tackle now 😀
That's probably true. I think people who read as a hobby tend to be more educated and more well-off. My early impression of Substack was that it was drawing writers who, 25 years ago, might have been writing for middlebrow and highbrow magazines like The Atlantic and The New York Review of Books.
Not necessarily "well off." You don't have to subscribe to be a reader of substack.
I have enjoyed the Substack community; it has a special good "feel" to it. Imagine my surprise when after unsubscribing from a really good newsletter here and receiving notifications from it that I was unsubscribed, a few days later I received a new edition of it from a different community called Beehiiv! How is that possible? I unsubscribed from that source also and have yet to hear back from them. Beehiiv seems a very different kind of host to writers and one I'm not comfortable with. Can a platform force you to stay subscribed?
Some folks publish in two places and transfer their subscribers from one to another. It's unlikely they want to force you to stay subscribed. More likely is that the authors don't sync their subscriber lists between one platform and the other. After unsubbing from Beehiv, you should be good to go.
I've tried, but they haven't replied! It looks like the writer sent a list of his subscribers to Beehiiv with my name on it, even though I had already unsubscribed from him.
Well, the person or company can alwayss send you stuff. Back in tthe day we called that "spam".
I'm not familiar with Beehiiv but this definitely sounds like Spam!
Chris speaks of imagining and I think that's great. Now let's imagine a platform that doesn't take advantage of people's tendency to be swayed by what others think.
Badges: You should like this because other people are paying for it.
Most popular post list: You should like this because other people liked it.
More than X subscribers: you should like this because... well you get the idea.
Imagine a platform that enabled you to find what you want and didn't try to sway your choices in this way. Imagine a platform that prized people making up their own mind above so-called social proof.
Weird, huh?
"Liking," points, number of comments, all create this bias. What did we have before the creation of the like button?
The "Like" button makes sense if, and only if, there is a "Dislike" button...
We had a sense, which nowadays I feel like calling The Sense, for it has become so rare as to seem of a mystical nature.
You had to actually write a reply or comment, although it could be minimal, like "This!"
This!
Well illustrated.
I actually feel like Reddit ticks a lot of these boxes. Ignoring all the issues Reddit has, the one thing I‘ve always respected about the platform is how there, the content is in focus. If you‘re interested in a certain topic you‘ll subscribe to it and get shown popular posts. Of course there you still have the „you should like this because others did too“ But I think when it comes to that kind of scale (and let‘s be honest, also quality) of content, this is inevitable. But also, this algorithm is very basic, only serving you what other‘s liked, not basing anything on your personal preferences. If you and I subscribe to the exact same Subreddits we can expect to be shown the exact same posts.
👏👏👏
Indeed, and I'm at times on the lookout for a recommendation. A tree surgeon, a carpenter, a brick layer... I go to friends and see if they know somebody because I don't want to pick out someone randomly.
Just fyi the checkmarks are to illustrate the number of paying subscribers (hollow orange for hundreds; solid orange for thousands; blue for tens of thousands), so they’re less a social credit system as on X and Facebook, but more a signal to readers that this or that publication has managed to attract a given number of paying subs. Obviously I have one, so you may think me biased, but it’s nice to have a system which automatically shows new subs that your work is of sufficient quality to merit paying for. Keeps the flywheel spinning.
Wouldn't it be helpful to also have a checkmark for those of use who are just starting to accrue paying subscribers to at least signal to readers "Hey here's some work to keep an eye on."?
Yes! I just started and have two out-of-nowhere pledges. It's mind-blowing... but if you search for me, even using my substack's exact name, I'm way down the list, with checkmarkers above me.
And this is where the bias comes into play when using algorithms. Not a big fan of their use in any app unless they are built to be equitable and not built to enhance a company's bottom line, which if we are going to be 100% honest here, that's exactly what the checkmarks are built for. By promoting Substackers with large subscriber bases it also promotes Substack's own revenue stream. I'm fine with them making money but be honest, don't use false virtue signalling by saying the checkmarks are a way of showing quality while not mentioning the strong marketing aspect behind them. Substack should be better than that.
Yeah, I know all the platforms seem to be doing away with the reverse chronological recent post search results and hashtags, but I always thought that approach was very fair. Everyone got an equal opportunity to be seen by people looking for that kind of thing.
Yep. If they aren't careful they'll start treading into the mired biased muck that is Medium.com
Just because a site has an orange or purple checkmark, doesn't mean you have to sign up for it. You can go there and look at it out of curiosity, but no one says you have to follow them if it's not your cup of tea.
Agreed. I was just bringing it up from a marketing psychology perspective.
Congrats! That's amazing. I turned off Pledges almost immediately because I was worried people would get confused as to what they were and think that I was asking for money.
Yeah, I was worried about that, but then I thought... you never know. I mean, clearly, two pledges, you never know. So I decided that my approach would be to not include any upgrade-subscription prompts anywhere except at the very, very bottom after I've already signed off, and I led with a "looking for more?" kind of spiel, and then I explained that "my newsletter is and always will be free (substack is supplementary to my primary writing, not my primary writing), but if you're looking for more, make a pledge and I'll see what I can do." And I wrote it in third person, which I think helped distance me from the ask, like it was substack doing it, not so much me. Anyway. Apparently it's not turning anyone off, and it's even enticing a couple people. So you might consider turning it back on. Hope this helps!
Thanks Megan, that's really great to hear.
I think part of the reason for me was also the fact that this is a side hobby (albeit one I'd love to turn serious at some stage), so it didn't feel necessary to have pledges. But, maybe you're right and maybe I will consider at some stage toggling that switch back on.
A couple of years ago, I was invited to Substack Grow. The criteria was people who had at least a 40% read rate. (There may have been other criteria, but that’s the one I remember.) There could be something like that? To signal that the people who DO subscribe like it enough to read it regularly? I’m not sure.
What I did learn from Grow is that people who write about cooking or travel or technology seem to have the “secret” on how to grow audiences. But the Grow folks didn’t feature anyone who was not already popular who grew big writing think pieces. What amuses me is there’s not even a category on this app for complicated think pieces. We don’t exist in Substack’s eyes. People are talking about checks and I’d just like a category.
Yes yes 🙌🏻
A new-comer badge, or even customisable badges might be a cool thing to have. It could be a bit of cosmetic fun if there wasn't any status attached to it.
I have 15,000 subscribers on Substack and zero ticks, checks, or whatever we're calling them. My subscribers are all interested in me and my work. I don't actively TRY to monetize them so most of my subscribers are free. I will in the next few months but I wanted to take it slow the first year on Substack and attract them to my work here before actively monetizing. But this doesn't invalidate the fact that I still have a solid subscriber base with over 75% reading each post I publish. This is where the ticks/checks don't really help ALL of us.
Congratulations. That is something to be proud of.
Maybe they should have badges for number of overall subscribers too? I suppose they already do list the number when they first visit a publication, or a profile on Notes, but it would be cool if there was also a more visual thing for overall numbers too
Mikey, understand totally ... also, putting my tiny hand up for the folk who genuinely don't want to have paying (or pledged) subscribers (just saying so for a me) - the playing field should level(ish) or at least not two escalators, one fast, one slow (rubbish analogy alert, which is one reason I won't charge for my musings!)
I think Substack do a pretty good job of keeping a level playing field overall. We all have access to the same tools. Substack Reads and getting featured on the homepage is not dependent on checkmarks (both happened to me before I got mine).
A more philosophical point - I have a strong belief that power laws are a fact of the universe, however we may feel about them, so I’m not sure there’s anything Substack, or any platform, could do to stop big winners arising from the mass of strivers. Not that all of us are even seeking to be the big winners, of course. Creating is worth doing for its own sake, regardless of following or monetary reward.
Philosophically speaking, it all depends how we measure winning ... as comparison is the thief of joy I am mightily of the hope that we all find some voices we enjoy hearing, and that we all end up being voices that find an audience of their own, whatever the size.
I would gently say, though, that as "a discovery system that attempts to maximize subscription revenue for writers" rolls out, the pitch leans a little more in favour of those in that space.
I'm very relaxed though, relishing the joy of creation.
You make a very good point, Barrie. Though I’m not sure what the alternative for Substack is, as they will need to earn money at some point. I have no idea but I doubt they’ve made a profit yet, given the Silicon Valley tech startup playbook
Of course, so true - and I guess the big hitters will end up supporting the business model and those with smaller reach (and modest ambitions).
There's an excellent recent post by Margaret Atwood which addresses the idea of taking paid subscriptions, dispersing the 10% to Substack before supporting charities with the rest. Lots of ways to flavour the recipe.
I appreciate that perspective, and delineating details. Fair points (and genuine congrats to you!).
Thank you. I hope you get one too very soon!
Understood and your point is well-taken. But the very fact of having checkmarks creates hierarchy, a distinction between you, who have one, and me, who does not. In the eye of a casual reader, they may not understand that nothing more is meant by it than what you say.
HELL YEAH!
Before I've reached 100 paying subs here, I wasn't getting a single new free subscriber from substack's platform, after reaching it, it started to grab people's attention— it's easy to gloss over publications such as ours 'cause like you I only have ~1000 total subs— yet pound-per-pound, we're deliving a product worth paying for, at least for the members of our audience, and that in itself can be intriguing for the potential reader.
The name Mr Potato is already pulling me in so the checkmark is the cherry on the top at this point 😂
Funny thing— here's the origin story— I was nicknamed Potato when I was 6yrs old because I had a T-shirt of Benny The Ball from Top Cat, here in Brazil his name was translated to "Batatinha" which means Small Potato in portuguese— now, 30 years later, my 18yo daughter's friends call me the equivalent to "Mr. Potato" HAHAHA
Ya! A capitalistic meritocracy, like former times. 😎
(SubStack is swimming against the tide of academia, with it's participation trophies. )
We startups must suck it up and adapt.
The problem with the “managed to attract paying subs” characterization is that, unlike you (the hardest working person on Substack) a lot of people come with a national profile of some sort, and built-in followers. Now, those people often bring new readers with them, and at least one of those previously popular writers recommended me, which boosted me for a month, for which I was grateful. (And I’ve managed to keep those new subscribers.) But I can see how when people are struggling to attract readers, the checks from the “popular club” can be disheartening. Also, most writers are not marketers. That is a needed skill to gain headway.
Well that’s very kind of you to say so, thank you. I can understand the frustration, but those people with built in followers didn’t get given those followers, they had to build them up over years too, albeit somewhere else. It takes insane patience but imho over a long enough timeline, anyone writing quality work with a consistent schedule will get there.
What if I wanted to keep all of my content free in perpetuity like the anarchist that I am? Shouldn't I get a little halo icon for that?
I agree.
We have a way to fix all of this and more. We need to make new systems that make the old ones obsolete - or in this case plug into their old systems and fix them with decentralization and transparency. Understanding this takes a little effort and it starts by using Human Swarm Intelligence to harness the Wisdom of the Crowd. For short, it is called "swarming." Scientists and medical fields looking to form decentralized systems need to be part of this. Start your journey here and stay tuned:
https://joshketry.substack.com/p/human-swarm-intelligence-the-most
Yes please.
Agree. No checkmark, please. It's time to evolve.
What I want is an algorithm that says "you haven't seen this content before, what do you think of it?"
Quality is in the eye of the beholder, and the beholder is always ME.
Show me new and different content. Show me content outside my comfort zone. Challenge me with new ideas.
I'll probably not like most of what I get shown by such an algorithm, but I will be greatly stimulated and satisfied by that algorithm.
I too notice that SubStack doesn't deliver me fresh new reads within easy reach. I have to go out and actively search for them. The Explore suggestions feel clunky, impersonal, and hard to scroll through and gauge. It's either brand new publications that are 7 days old, or the big boys, and they feel like random suggestions -- they rarely match my interests or tastes, but they're also not challenging or stimulating as you suggest.
I have to assume that this also means that our publications are not being suggested to others once we're no longer new and exciting, or a big boy.
I would take random if it was truly random and meant that more people were getting more visibility.
When the perception is other than that the curation algorithm perhaps could use some rethinking.
I feel the same way about the Explore section. It seems neglected in terms of curatorial effort.
And even the content I’ve previously said “not interested” in, I’d like to have shown again a few months or so later. After all, tastes, interests and opinions change. 🙃
Absolutely! Growth does happen! 😉
Yes! Every word of this 🤝
A human 'algorithm' ... yes, yes!
Perfect!!!
Every word that my brain resonates!
+1 to this :)
Curation is certainly one approach.
The only thing I REALLY hope happens here is that Substack could maybe pick a random newbie who IS NOT famous and announce their presence here lol. Elizabeth Gilbert didn't need an announcement...she showed up with her own million people in her pocket 😂
I just hope algorithms never put celebrities in front of me. I can find those on my own. Give me the regular folk who are writing amazing things.
Yeah my only way to get noticed right now is to write random comments like this and hope it pique's interest lol
Have you ever been a writer on Medium? I've been over there for years so I've sprinkled some links in my Medium posts.
Otherwise, commenting (like you're already doing) has worked wonders for me. I subscribe to lots of other Substacks and really engage in their comments and communities.
This sounds like the old days of blogging. Comment. Engage. Build your readers.
I literally wrote an article about that the other day. I do miss the good old days of blogging.
https://medium.com/the-journal-of-firsts/substack-brings-back-the-small-town-feel-of-the-old-school-blogging-community-67fbd2faead2
At the risk of commenting here instead of over there :) great article! I too miss those old days and it really was like small towns we were building. Substack so far seems to be the closest thing I’ve found to replicating that feeling.
I couldn't help sending you that link because your comment just hit me. Fingers crossed that we find here what we loved about blogging!
I'll mutually subscribe! haha.
I was deciding where to put my effort between Substack and Medium when I began my project and went with this one because it feels more vibrant with a larger community.
I will say it IS more vibrant and intimate here but Medium itself has such a high page rank that it's a great springboard for other endeavors. But if you're a newbie on Medium it's difficult to get noticed. You could always cross-post your stuff from here onto Medium and link back to here. Lots of Medium writers have moved here and do the cross-posting thing.
Yeah that's a good idea :)
Agree, the Substack reads needs to highlight more unknown voices
Amen to this. Elizabeth Gilbert coming here was just a big non-event to me. I don’t know what the big deal is.
LOOOOL I think you and I are the ONLY ones who don't care. I had to "mute author" just to be able to keep up with my feed.
I didn't know her before she got here, so it was a non-event for me. I had to look her up to figure out who she was, and it's still a non-event for me.
Well, when I first posted a Note, it was to announce the debut of my blog here. Someone from Substack liked and restacked it… and no one else seemed to give a damn. Just saying….
Yeah that sounds about the same as my notes lol.
True. I’d like that as well. And though I like Elizabeth Gilbert and have enjoyed a few of her books, the focus of her substack isn’t really something I’m interested in right now so it’d be nice to find other writers who ARE writing content that I’m interested in right now.
Agreed, 100%
Yessss!!
Mouthful of truth 🔥
I’m really excited to see that there’s a new version of the app coming out. There’s so much potential here. Looking forward to seeing where it all goes! Proud to be a writer on substack, a place that seems far more in alignment with my values.
I'm also looking forward to whatever new app changes are incoming.
I wish you guys would build a better and more robust search engine for Substack and our own posts e.g. I struggle to find stocks that I know I have written about in previous posts with the current search engine...
Agree on comments regarding search engine improvement. How difficult would it be to be able to search key words with a time sort function (that would show ALL results based upon post date - not how successful that writer already is or what SS thinks one SHOULD read). No other interface/algorithm needed. People can choose to use this feature or not. People can decide on their own if they want to read or not. This really is not rocket science....shows this matter is more about control, not content, nor individual free will.
I would love to be able to search for writers by more niche categories and keywords. It would help to build community around the niche topics I write about (food allergies, Judaism, and wildlife conservation). Beyond that, I know there are many writers on Substack who write about unusual topics, and I’d be keen to have a way to find them and uncover a new potential interest.
ITS hugely annoying in my case because I always link the stock name to the IR page and ALL the tickers from major exchanges when the primary listing is not the NYSE-NASDAQ... So I have look up the tickers on Google finance, link them to the Yahoo! Finance quote, hunt for the IR page (no always easy if the stock's website is not in English and I have to use the browser translator...) etc. I hate doing work I have already done over again when I should be able to just quickly search for a previous post where the stock was mentioned and cut and paste...
Oh yea, they need to make the tag feature easier to use for old posts e.g. its easy to recategorize or retag old posts in Wordpress at the back end. Substack nictitates you to open individual posts, tag them, and resave them with a date error often happening on the first save attempt....
I am using the tag feature for some posts and its very useful. I did mention to Linda they should do a cloud or something as tags start to clutter the front page e.g. see https://emergingmarketskeptic.substack.com/ on a desktop-laptop computer for where and how I have organized the tags...
Agree! Discovery could be as easy as allowing writers to categorize their own content or search by tags. It would give readers full control while preventing all the pitfalls that come with algorithms.
"We are not against algorithms. We’ll enthusiastically use algorithms, or AI, or any other technology we can get our hands on, as long as we can use them to serve the human ends that we care about. For readers, that means letting you decide what you read as the best version of yourself—helping you take back your mind."
I am very vehemently against algorithms or any kind of "curation" I am not 100% in complete control off. I really hope I am not reading too much in between the lines here.
Algorithms inherently strip humans of their agency. That's literally their purpose. They are designed to specifically say to users, "Look at this, but not that. Think about this, but not that. This is what's popular, not that. You'll like this. Trust me."
In high school, I used to sit for hours on MySpace listening to every band that self-listed their music under all the genre categories I liked. This was before algorithms. Follower counts were an afterthought. It was all 100% organic. Finding good musicians felt like I'd won the lottery. I did the same on Livejournal. Finding good writers and artists there was like scoring the jackpot.
I found so many quality creatives back then that I'm certain today's algorithms would overlook due to their less commercial sounds or more unique worldviews. As algorithms slowly took over, many of those creatives disappeared into the digital void -- or otherwise joined the ranks of homogeny to maintain their status online. Algorithms don't like outliers. They require us to fall into line if we want to be heard or seen.
I don't know why we can't just go back to no algorithms. I'm assuming it has something to do with dollars and levels of control that aren't obvious to us from the outside.
I'm also uncomfortable with an algorithm dictating what it thinks the "best version" of me should look like. That's scary language. No technology in the world knows the best version of myself better than me.
"Algorithms don't like outliers." Wow! Exactly! You've perfectly described the essence of what I've been trying to articulate for the last hour! Thank you!
Awh yay I'm glad!! I've noticed this for years (I was even interviewed by a national photography magazine a few years ago about my opinions on the homogeny of social media -- of course it was published in print, haha, go figure!)
I honestly don't think algorithms would have boosted many of humanity's most cherished writers and musicians and artists and journalists of the past. What those people were doing and saying was far too innovative and unique to get promoted by an algorithm -- and often even subversive to the status quo of their time. An algorithm would have overlooked them, or possibly even demoted their visibility, based on the exact same qualities that humans today celebrate them for.
I agree! What's interesting to me is that all human art is a form of communication -- it expresses a particular human's experience and existence in a specific time and place. Every piece of human-made art is a piece of human history, and a testament to our collective history.
Today, AI takes all of those historical human experiences and statements, renders them meaningless, jumbles and reassembles them like some kind of artistic Frankenstein, and then pops out whatever visual qualities someone asked for on command.
I suppose that, in itself, is a testament to our current time and place -- but what a sad and empty time it is. Will the art of the future simply be a machine following orders? It's dismal to think about.
You have nailed it in the head. It is built with imitation as a foundation. In its current incarnation, there is little room for originality. The patterns from each model become more evident the more each model is used. Aesthetically the output is akin to 1996 clipart with 2023 pixel density.
I suspect the AI is trained on 1970s book covers.
I too felt uncomfortable with that choice of words. Yet that may well have been the most accurate, best worded expression of where this is really going.
That's what I'm afraid of.
Yeah, one of the issues that I have is the assumption that they can control things better than others have in the past. That it won’t just go off the rails like everything else. It’s incredibly presumptuous of them.
I am extremely skeptical about this. Not because I don't believe in the team here, but because I have also seen way too many times already where the path always ends.
Me too. Everyone who tries it assumes that they have the magic knowledge that will solve the whole problem of the internet. They all end up in a terrible place. This is why I have diversified where my Substack content is. Because I don’t want to presume that they will do everything correctly and I won’t end up in a worse place.
Me too. I think this is because I am old and prefer my own control.
I don't consider myself old but I do consider myself sick and tired of others pointing me toward what I should and should not consume. I genuinely hope that is not what will be going on here.
I agree. Medium platform does this and it is confining for me as a reader to wade through to reach and explore what I'd like to pursue on my own. They undulate me with emails to suggest "what I might like." Curation be damned.
Substack's statement triggered the PTSD from Medium's emails! I completely unsubscribed from all Medium notifications because of them.
Yes I was thinking the same.
You could read that as someone else deciding what is the best version of ourselves, which hopefully isn't the case.
Or it could be read as using our purposeful selection of reading to predict which general categories we aren't interested in, thereby preventing us from wading through large quantities of what we don't want in the explore areas. That saves time and frustration. Scrolling really changes when personal preferences, or categories of interest are completely turned off.
I actually don't mind tons of reading in varied subjects. I used to do that in the early days of social media, before algorithms, and it helped me discover a lot of creative people that I never would have discovered today with the "help" of algorithms.
One thing (of many) that I dislike about algorithms is the illusion of choice that they create. I would rather just do the hard work of reading a lot myself -- the way humans used to do back when they went to libraries and bookstores and read magazines and newspapers made of paper.
Whenever you give sex, age, and preferences on an app, you are setting algorithms.
I cleared a old smartphone and downloaded the tiktok app for an experience of a sort of pre-algorithm searching. I gave minimum to no preference, and demographic data, and the wrong (adult) age, to obtain the most un-algorithmic experience for awhile. Tiktok was like an alien world. Age is really big for algorithms. Rather than buying smart phone insurance we always used old phones for backup. I had several wrong age accounts to see how it changes such things as the news feeds and what is promoted in email.
I'm interested in just about anything, but I would like the algorithms to leave out porn, most hollywood and celebrity stuff, and long (TMI) discussions about the activities of personal hygiene. That saves scroll time.
An active search function is different, and should bring up what your words ask for, based direct relevance as much as possible. That's why I use alternative search engines to Bing, Google, Yahoo, etc.
Yes, I noticed that too! When the pandemic started, I made a Twitter account to keep up with breaking news. I didn't enter any of my demographic info because I just planned to use it like an RSS feed. Once everything got politicized, which happened shockingly fast, I made a point to follow equal numbers of people on the left and right to balance the information I was seeing.
It was insane -- what I saw was evidence that people on all sides were being fed different lies and half-truths while being led to believe their side was the right one. It was really sad, and it was even more sad that Twitter's leadership was actively leaning into it and fueling divisions, rather than fixing the algorithm and giving users access to balanced information.
I also noticed similar phenomenon to what you described with TikTok during the two hours I had an account before deleting it in total disgust, haha.
Algorithms are no joke. They can be really harmful. I'm skeptical that there's any way to make them work for humans, even under leadership that has the very best of intentions.
I have a Twitter account, but once they stuck a fork in SubStack, I'm not trying to grow the Twit presence. Why bother? Twitter banned a lot of people, including data analysts who came up with "wrong" conclusions, by merely graphing publicly accessible info. Some journalists who gazed upon "The Twitter Files" and wrote about the ties between Twitter and government are now at SubStack, in some cases after they were kicked out by prior employers. Interestingly, in July, a federal court has ordered the U.S. executive branch of government to cease and desist its activities to influence the content of social media.
I agree! And yes -- I'm so glad there are people defending public access to information using the legal system. What those lawsuits are doing is incredibly important. The outcomes of those lawsuits will reveal whether there is anything that sets America apart from authoritarian regimes.
I also think it would be wise for American lawyers to start challenging what constitutes "good faith" content moderation (as required under Section 230) -- because in my opinion, what I saw happen on Twitter during the pandemic, with the manipulation of algorithms and the stifling or amplification of different information for users of different demographics, was not done in good faith.
Can you say more about why you are against curation of any kind?
(Thinking: the best writing is, itself, a kind of skillful curation.)
Correct. I am specifically referring to gatekeeping by the platform under the veil of "curation" where certain authors or articles are artificially surfaced based on arbitrary metrics. Anything that comes between me and the author of the work is unnecessary.
If it were yours to do, how would you encourage discovery without using curation as a starting point?
(Are you on Tumblr, btw? The pinnacle of social media that, at least historically, has one of the least top-down curated social experiences on the planet? ;-) )
I think taking people you follow and posts you like or restack as a starting point can lead to good results. I'm just not sure why some algorithms do a good job of this and some don't. For example, Spotify pretty consistently suggests music that I like by musicians I've often never heard of, while Netflix is more like "You gave a thumbs-up to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, so we thought you might like High School Hot Tub."
ha! :)
Ohhh, yes. I agree on Spotify. I wonder how their algorithm works.
I follow my own curiosity for discovery. Depending on the topic, I like to have free rein on how shallow or how deep I want to go. But if as a hypothetical my job description required me to contaminate the pool, I would start by putting a handicap on reach to make sure the playing field is equalized and everyone gets a fair shot. Then, I would employ a community based up/down voting system to determine what stays on top.
Fascinating idea about the handicap. Wondering about the implications of that.
Two more questions :) ...
• Where do you mainly find the means to follow your curiosity?
• Have you seen a community-based up/down voting system that works and isn't heavily gamed by users who want more attention?
Yeah the handicap is key to ensure the oxygen isn't constantly sucked out of the room by the ones with the most followers. This becomes increasingly important as the platform matures and the gap between those who've been at it for a while and those who are just starting out widens.
As far as curiosity, my life mostly revolves around travel, so I usually pursue things that are informed by my interactions with others and IRL experiences. I am fascinated by exploring how others live and typically spend a lot of time talking to others. My life online is merely an extension of that.
I think Reddit though not perfect, has found a decent balance when it comes to up/down voting. The community in most subs is also very good at calling out others that are blatantly trying to horde attention.
Very much so. There are great authors from all walks of life here, yet there seems to be a not so subtle bias towards the low hanging fruit that can bring in the most revenue with the least amount of effort. The paragraph I quoted above just reeked of this in between the lines.
Yes. There is enough of that already out there and it is precisely what has contaminated so many other platforms to the point they are pretty much useless for anything other than dopamine hits.
I love what you are building and am grateful for a more thoughtful place to hang out online!
Me too
I mean, you say this and I want to believe you, but... even though I'm not (and don't plan to)monetize my writing here, even though my whole reason for being here is to get away from that, my "notes" feed is still filled with "how I made a zillion dollars on substack" articles that I've never clicked on and have no interest in.
I can only conclude that since substack only makes money when writers are successful at monetizing their publications, this is the algorithm priotizing the needs of the owners over what I'm here for.
So you know, there is that... (said with all affection -- I'm happy to be here, but those articles and the relentless focus on money money money is troubling and a bit of a sour note in all of it...)
Those Note’s feeds are laughable and annoying. You have to scroll for ten minutes before hitting any posts related to you by some degree. My favorite is when the feed just loops through all the same people, all with check marks, none having any association with me.
The loop is so strange. Same stuff coming back around, and yet I’ve been here for over two months and can’t get any traction in Notes for the life of me (unless I comment on any of the 10 writers showing up in my loop, lol).
LOL nobody reads my notes either. I just talk to myself in there.
Me too - I actually use Notes as notes.
haha this is the BEST example of someone who TRANSFORMED into a successfull newsletter owner! Chapeau, Kristi! I'll feature this. It's genius.
"I knew her when... "
Lol I'll send out autographs later 😁
I think it's pretty cool we've known each other since Medium days and have both made names for ourselves here though.
I think the only way to be successful at Notes is to engage with others whenever you post a note, but it has to be with the right people, where your comments will be seen and responded to, i.e., talk to the popular kids. This will get your note circulating in their feeds. Still, it means nothing if those writers don't engage with what you post, and many of them won't. I find Notes very frustrating. I wish I had never wasted my time trying it, as I promised I wouldn't. I don't bother anymore.
I do believe you've nailed it. The problem with Notes is that it's all about finding writers who are good at... posting notes. That is, those who play the game which has as its #1 rule is that you must pretend it isn't a game.
I've had a few interesting exchanges on Notes, and that's great. But it seems to be way more about the popular folks sitting around patting each other on the back, and the not so popular tapping the door in the hope to be noticed.
And there you have it, as you said Corey. The inner circle expands but it's less about the person's work that yields the mutual support, and more about the social personality that one can display.
That's my take anyway. Same dynamic as writers on Twitter.
I can't vouch for Twitter. My only other social media experience is a brief stint on LinkedIn, which I think works very similar to Notes. The more you engage with others the more your notes will circulate, and the more chance you have of reaching more people. Notes seem more limited, though. I know it's a nook compared to other platforms, but to see the same ten people at the top of my feed whenever I go on is irksome. Like you said, it is a game, like any other social platform. If you really want to expand your audience using Notes and the like, you must talk to people you wouldn't normally talk to and pretend they're as awesome as they think they are.
I restack posts sometimes, mine and others, and then always wonder what I was thinking because I know nobody saw it. I don't have the time right now to spend three hours patting backs just to get some views, nor do I care to.
I thought it was just me!
This is really heartening to read! So many of us (both writers on Substack and readers) are trying to do intentional work to curate our experience and what we take in each day, yet (of course) find ourselves derailed by the inherent algorithmic realities that push us in various directions. (And some of us write a lot about it to help others!😆)
I’m really excited about this - and I think as with anything else, it’s knowing what we don’t know that gives us the agency to actually learn. This sounds like an amazing way for people to experience the shift in their own reading/algorithm experience, and then see how drastic and empowering a different way could be. Here for it! ✏️💙
The flywheel of Substack is accelerating as the quantity of quality writing takes off. In the spirit of challenging convictions and understanding the why, hosting debates between prominent authors with differing perspectives could be a huge draw for Substack. Here are a few matchups I'd love to see: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/great-substack-debates-matchups
One of my favorite things to do when I was in college, twenty years ago, was to look up debates that challenged the very core of what I believed in. And I'd just lie down and listen to them, for days on end. It was so refreshing and never antagonistic—just me, the CD, and the screen. I love the idea of Substack putting that sort of constructive content that challenges one's thinking in front of us. Not to get us to rage engage, but to expand our thinking.
Love the idea Yuri! I think substack released "letters" which allows for this type of back and forth format.
Beautifully written. I am very excited for Substack and its writers’ and readers futures. Keep it up!
I just joined the Substack community, changing from a blog to Substack. I found you just as you suggest, by receiving messages that intrigue me. Thank you.
Me too. I joined Substack about a year ago because all the writers I liked best were here. This community is so much more in my zone -- writing not to sell another product but for the love of writing and sharing with others.
I love the phrase "curate your attention". So easily, our attention gets curated by others and our days just go by mindlessly.
I’ve read this 4 times and still have no idea what you’re announcing, but keep up the great work!
This is not an announcement this is my attempt to share some of the principles behind what we are doing.
We'll have an actual announcement for you soon
They’re sharing their Why.
I felt the same way. It’s a bit of feel good jargon. At the same time, I’m enjoying what Substack is doing (generally) and I have a vague sense of excitement for the thing coming that I can’t discern 😆
Dying lmfao!!!
😄😄
I love what you're building. Looking forward to a corner of the internet where the cream rises to the top.
Algorithm for quality? Really? What a horrendous thought. Turing will be turning over in his grave. It's the human intelllect that creates, not machines. Substack, turn back before it's too late!