How I’d rebuild print media 

This is one of the key reasons we started Substack. We’re attempting to build an alternative media economy that gives journalists autonomy. If you don’t rely on ads for your revenue, you don’t have to be a pawn in the attention economy – which means you don’t have to compete with Facebook and Google. If you’re not playing the ads game, you can stop... See more

I came of age in the Napster days, when only fools spent money on anything digital. Early on, we decided that we’d rather pay for the internet with attention instead of money. This seemed like a good idea at the time, and at first, it was!

It was like having a big party sponsored by Mazda, and all that meant was having the Mazda logo on the Solo cu... See more

We believe that subscriptions are better than advertising.

Independent internet-native creators leverage the internet’s frictionless content creation and distribution, but they’re still trapped by traditional business models like subscriptions and advertising.

A subscription model is based on the promise of the production of future gated content. A publication or creator is paid to continue production, not ... See more

What changed was the feed, something uniquely enabled by digital. Whereas a newspaper had to be defined up-front, such that it could be printed and distributed at scale, a feed is tailored to the individual in real-time — and so are the advertisements. Suddenly it was print that was worth pennies, while the Internet generally and mobile especially ... See more

“We believe that journalistic content has intrinsic value and that it doesn’t have to be given away for free. We believe that what you read matters. And we believe that there has never been a better time to bolster and protect those ideals. Now, more than ever, publishers of news and similar content can be profitable through direct payments from re... See more