I think it’s fair to be frank and say that the internet has largely gone to shit. The rise of the attention economy and influencers, the dumpster fire that is X/Twitter, AI clickbait and subpar Medium posts – I find it rather difficult to find great articles by brilliant thinkers.
These folks seem to be increasingly attracted to Substack (consequently, so am I). It’s been initially backed by YC and Andreessen Horowitz and has been around for almost 10 years, and the rise has been pleasantly quiet. I assume that’s part of the appeal to the growing community of thinkers.
There’s no ads, no algorithmic feeds, no middleman – just great authors getting paid directly by their readers (if they choose to enable monetization). I’ve been greatly enjoying it, and encourage you to give it a shot. Some of my personal favorites are Scott Barker, Anton Leicht, Sebastian Raschka, Nathan Lambert, and Simon Willison.
There’s some more detailed information about the Rise of Substack by Paul O’Brien and Falon Fatemi, which I simply leave as links.
Daniel Lenz 