I really dislike your Leaderboard idea. You're going the way of Medium, in that you're rewarding the popular writers and making good writing a popularity contest. That's not how you build a community. You build a community by aiding and encouraging all writers to do their best and make the most of the Substack opportunities.
It's still basically a newsletter platform and these continual popularity challenges, where everyone has to strive for some artificial Substack success goal, aren't helping us to build our subscriber list. They may help to make Substack more popular, but you're leaving a whole lot of good people out in the process. I sincerely wish you would rethink this.
Hey, I'm one of the engineers who worked on this and I wanted to jump in to give a little more context on how we thought about these, specifically the "Writer Favorites" leaderboard.
This leaderboard is actually designed such that it would be comprised of smaller, largely new (to Substack) writers. In fact, the larger a Substack is, the harder it is for it to make that list. We're thinking a lot about how to better support new and emerging Substacks, and are really excited by this way to put some wind behind new writers' sails.
The other nice thing about this design is that we hope that writers can "grow out" of this leaderboard by getting bigger and more established, which allows it to be much more dynamic than our existing category-based ones, where our bigger writers tend to have a more stable place.
I appreciate your response, Ben, but that's not what I'm seeing:
The Writer favorites leaderboard surfaces writers who receive an outsized number of recommendations from other Substack writers. This category spotlights emerging publications that have yet to be discovered by a mass readership.
The Featured recommenders leaderboard celebrates writers who, by turning on recommendations, are sending lots of new subscribers to fellow writers on Substack.
"...who receive an outsized number of recommendations" and "sending lots of new subscribers to fellow writers" smacks of a popularity contest. If I'm misreading this, please explain. I really don't like what I'm seeing as potentially happening here.
So I think the bit that you might be missing is that these are all relative to the publication's size. For example, if you have 50 readers, you need many many fewer recommendations and subscriptions sent than if you have a Substack with hundreds or thousands of readers..
We tried to design these both to surface Substacks that are doing well for their size, as opposed to just ones that are doing well by more "objective" metrics.
Ben, when you use a term like 'who receive out-sized numbers of recommendations...' how else would I interpret that except as a popularity push?
If you really want to assist new and unknown writers, then do it internally by finding promising writers and highlighting them on your own front pages. Do it often and fairly. This is not fair. This is allowing writers to pick and choose, and of course they'll choose their own friends and form their own cheer-leading parties. It'll encourage those with the loudest voices and the most energy to dominate everything.
This is exactly what happened at Medium and it turned thousands of us off. I love Substack precisely because there was none of that clubiness. I felt we all had a standing here and we were appreciated as a writing community.
This will turn into a hive of cliques faster than you can say the word.
Our team is listening as we experiment with the leaderboards and we will charge on with our efforts to feature new and unknown writers in the places like the What to Read series On Substack.
Katie, you know l love and appreciate Substack and all of you who work so hard to come up with ways to make the entire experience better, but I see this system as having some huge flaws. I'm just asking that you look at it from all angles--including this one.
I read the piece you linked by Chris Best and I find it admirable, but it didn't address what I'm talking about here. In fact, he says specifically that writers shouldn't be valued only by how much attention they can command.
You are encouraging other writers to be the arbiters of someone else's success, and that will end badly--just as it did at Medium. It's one thing to discover a writer you admire and to brag that person up, sharing their work and encouraging others to read them, but it's quite another to make it a feature. A contest. A tit-for-tat, which is what I believe it will become.
But it could be I'm all wrong about how this is going to work, so I'll hold my judgement until it's well underway. I just wanted to offer my own fears, based on what I've seen happen before.
"If you really want to assist new and unknown writers, then do it internally by finding promising writers and highlighting them on your own front pages. Do it often and fairly."
yes. or, do it randomly, by lottery. anything other than encouraging the sad, desperate social media phoniness of campaigning for empty 'likes' from other members to achieve self-promotion.
Hi Ben, thank you for your work on this, and also for your reply. I appreciate that. In the existing category-based ones, when you switch from "Paid" to "All", what is the criteria for a newsletter to make that "All" list in the first place? Also, what determines the order of its listing? Engagement metrics, growth rate, community participation,...something else? Cheers!
Hi Ben, thanks for this explanation. You mention that the leaderboard is designed to be "comprised of smaller, largely new (to Substack) writers." That doesn't appear to be the case for me at least. My newsletter doesn't even appear in the only category it would fit (Health & Wellness) so that I'm basically invisible to anyone on Substack (or anyone searching Substack), unless I comment on threads. How do I raise my visibility? 🤔
Another way this could have been done is to encourage writers to do a biweekly/monthly shout-out post where they write a detailed article about why the newsletter they’re recommending is worth checking out. Then Substack features one of these balanced shout-out posts, increasing views for the recommender and the recommend-ee(lol). It incentivises people to be honest.
I do something like that at Writer Everlasting with my Friday Boost, but I do it specifically to encourage all writers and to build their confidence. I try not to make a big issue of any one writer, and I don't necessarily choose the most popular. I just look for writing that moves me in one way or another in any given week and highlight it.
Every new product update from Substack is filled with an abundance of badass deliciousness. Makes me wanna bring a huge bowl and big spoon to the Substack desert counter.
Hi! Cool stuff in this update. Would love to see a feature that auto turns your entire archive into being for paid subscribers only, but with free bit before paywall.
Very excited about the new podcasting updates! I just implemented my first podcast version of my articles, and am hoping that this opens up accessibility to the audience!
I’m glad you brought that up. That platform is riddled with people desperately trying to get followers so that they can remain in the payout program. Recommendations can also turn incredibly cliquey: referring to friends who in turn refer you. Or everybody refers the same five mainstream newsletter that already has enough and more traffic.
I'm not going to get many or any recommendations because I write on stocks and options. That doesn't interest many Substack writers. Even other financial writers here seem to not read each others' work. They don't seem to be in a mood to collaborate to build Substack as a place to find good trading ideas.
At the same time, I won't recommend many writers. My reading is focused on the markets, politics and topics not covered on Substack. My plate is full, and I'm not looking for more great writers. I'm a paid subscriber to web sites and publications that help me make better decisions about life, politics and the markets. They have a lot of "great writers."
Those publications and services more than fill my time along with my newsletter and trading.
I agree with commenters who warn that friends will help each other with recommendations. If you don't know other writers, you won't get that many recommendations. But if that gets some people more readers and subscribers, what's the harm? Some of those new content consumers may find you sooner than you think.
Life is not fair, as JFK once said.
There are other ways to promote writers, as I've written here in the last few weeks.
Also, if video takes off, how is this any different than any other social media app? I started building here to be away from the over stimulation and noise. If this turns into a new YouTube I’m going to be really disappointed
I really dislike your Leaderboard idea. You're going the way of Medium, in that you're rewarding the popular writers and making good writing a popularity contest. That's not how you build a community. You build a community by aiding and encouraging all writers to do their best and make the most of the Substack opportunities.
It's still basically a newsletter platform and these continual popularity challenges, where everyone has to strive for some artificial Substack success goal, aren't helping us to build our subscriber list. They may help to make Substack more popular, but you're leaving a whole lot of good people out in the process. I sincerely wish you would rethink this.
Hey, I'm one of the engineers who worked on this and I wanted to jump in to give a little more context on how we thought about these, specifically the "Writer Favorites" leaderboard.
This leaderboard is actually designed such that it would be comprised of smaller, largely new (to Substack) writers. In fact, the larger a Substack is, the harder it is for it to make that list. We're thinking a lot about how to better support new and emerging Substacks, and are really excited by this way to put some wind behind new writers' sails.
The other nice thing about this design is that we hope that writers can "grow out" of this leaderboard by getting bigger and more established, which allows it to be much more dynamic than our existing category-based ones, where our bigger writers tend to have a more stable place.
I appreciate your response, Ben, but that's not what I'm seeing:
The Writer favorites leaderboard surfaces writers who receive an outsized number of recommendations from other Substack writers. This category spotlights emerging publications that have yet to be discovered by a mass readership.
The Featured recommenders leaderboard celebrates writers who, by turning on recommendations, are sending lots of new subscribers to fellow writers on Substack.
"...who receive an outsized number of recommendations" and "sending lots of new subscribers to fellow writers" smacks of a popularity contest. If I'm misreading this, please explain. I really don't like what I'm seeing as potentially happening here.
So I think the bit that you might be missing is that these are all relative to the publication's size. For example, if you have 50 readers, you need many many fewer recommendations and subscriptions sent than if you have a Substack with hundreds or thousands of readers..
We tried to design these both to surface Substacks that are doing well for their size, as opposed to just ones that are doing well by more "objective" metrics.
Ben, when you use a term like 'who receive out-sized numbers of recommendations...' how else would I interpret that except as a popularity push?
If you really want to assist new and unknown writers, then do it internally by finding promising writers and highlighting them on your own front pages. Do it often and fairly. This is not fair. This is allowing writers to pick and choose, and of course they'll choose their own friends and form their own cheer-leading parties. It'll encourage those with the loudest voices and the most energy to dominate everything.
This is exactly what happened at Medium and it turned thousands of us off. I love Substack precisely because there was none of that clubiness. I felt we all had a standing here and we were appreciated as a writing community.
This will turn into a hive of cliques faster than you can say the word.
Hi Ramona, thank you for your feedback!
There is no perfect system but we are working to create a better one. Chris our founder writers on that here: https://on.substack.com/p/breaking-off-the-engagement?s=w
Our team is listening as we experiment with the leaderboards and we will charge on with our efforts to feature new and unknown writers in the places like the What to Read series On Substack.
Katie, you know l love and appreciate Substack and all of you who work so hard to come up with ways to make the entire experience better, but I see this system as having some huge flaws. I'm just asking that you look at it from all angles--including this one.
I read the piece you linked by Chris Best and I find it admirable, but it didn't address what I'm talking about here. In fact, he says specifically that writers shouldn't be valued only by how much attention they can command.
You are encouraging other writers to be the arbiters of someone else's success, and that will end badly--just as it did at Medium. It's one thing to discover a writer you admire and to brag that person up, sharing their work and encouraging others to read them, but it's quite another to make it a feature. A contest. A tit-for-tat, which is what I believe it will become.
But it could be I'm all wrong about how this is going to work, so I'll hold my judgement until it's well underway. I just wanted to offer my own fears, based on what I've seen happen before.
Thanks for opening this up to comments.
"If you really want to assist new and unknown writers, then do it internally by finding promising writers and highlighting them on your own front pages. Do it often and fairly."
yes. or, do it randomly, by lottery. anything other than encouraging the sad, desperate social media phoniness of campaigning for empty 'likes' from other members to achieve self-promotion.
A big 'yes'!
Hi Ben, thank you for your work on this, and also for your reply. I appreciate that. In the existing category-based ones, when you switch from "Paid" to "All", what is the criteria for a newsletter to make that "All" list in the first place? Also, what determines the order of its listing? Engagement metrics, growth rate, community participation,...something else? Cheers!
I would like to know this too, please.
Love it! Thanks, Ben!
Hi Ben, thanks for this explanation. You mention that the leaderboard is designed to be "comprised of smaller, largely new (to Substack) writers." That doesn't appear to be the case for me at least. My newsletter doesn't even appear in the only category it would fit (Health & Wellness) so that I'm basically invisible to anyone on Substack (or anyone searching Substack), unless I comment on threads. How do I raise my visibility? 🤔
Another way this could have been done is to encourage writers to do a biweekly/monthly shout-out post where they write a detailed article about why the newsletter they’re recommending is worth checking out. Then Substack features one of these balanced shout-out posts, increasing views for the recommender and the recommend-ee(lol). It incentivises people to be honest.
I do something like that at Writer Everlasting with my Friday Boost, but I do it specifically to encourage all writers and to build their confidence. I try not to make a big issue of any one writer, and I don't necessarily choose the most popular. I just look for writing that moves me in one way or another in any given week and highlight it.
I would hate to think it was a contest.
Now I’ll know I’ve made it as a writer when Mean Mike features me in his recommendations. Thanks Substack
Love the podcast UI. Looking forward to trying it. Thanks for all the hard work y'all do.
I love how Substack's engineers are working as hard as the Substack writers! Thank you!
I love how you keep adding features. I think I came to the right place. :)
Is there any discussion around being able to monetize pieces individually rather than a monthly subscription?
Every new product update from Substack is filled with an abundance of badass deliciousness. Makes me wanna bring a huge bowl and big spoon to the Substack desert counter.
Hi! Cool stuff in this update. Would love to see a feature that auto turns your entire archive into being for paid subscribers only, but with free bit before paywall.
Very excited about the new podcasting updates! I just implemented my first podcast version of my articles, and am hoping that this opens up accessibility to the audience!
Thanks Substack for continuing to improve the UI and UX, and improving discoverability!!
This is so cool, thanks for being at the forefront of newsletter innovation all the time!
Fantastic to have new leaderboards. Thank you.
I don't agree at all. It's a popularity contest, and that's always anathema to writers struggling with self-esteem anyway. It's why I left Medium.
I’m glad you brought that up. That platform is riddled with people desperately trying to get followers so that they can remain in the payout program. Recommendations can also turn incredibly cliquey: referring to friends who in turn refer you. Or everybody refers the same five mainstream newsletter that already has enough and more traffic.
Exactly. And now it's as if Substack is looking at the worst of Medium and trying to emulate them. I'm surprised and saddened.
Is it possible to control the order of recommendations? I have more than 5 but I’d love to be able to switch up which ones present first.
I'm not going to get many or any recommendations because I write on stocks and options. That doesn't interest many Substack writers. Even other financial writers here seem to not read each others' work. They don't seem to be in a mood to collaborate to build Substack as a place to find good trading ideas.
At the same time, I won't recommend many writers. My reading is focused on the markets, politics and topics not covered on Substack. My plate is full, and I'm not looking for more great writers. I'm a paid subscriber to web sites and publications that help me make better decisions about life, politics and the markets. They have a lot of "great writers."
Those publications and services more than fill my time along with my newsletter and trading.
I agree with commenters who warn that friends will help each other with recommendations. If you don't know other writers, you won't get that many recommendations. But if that gets some people more readers and subscribers, what's the harm? Some of those new content consumers may find you sooner than you think.
Life is not fair, as JFK once said.
There are other ways to promote writers, as I've written here in the last few weeks.
Also, if video takes off, how is this any different than any other social media app? I started building here to be away from the over stimulation and noise. If this turns into a new YouTube I’m going to be really disappointed
How would video sites hurt other Substack newsletters?
Still waiting for the Android app...