The Medium Is The Message

Our modest goal with Substack is to help accelerate and amplify the advent of the culture future through a better media system. Culture is not just about getting what you want; it is about learning what to want. It shapes our values, beliefs, identity, taste, and how we relate to other people. And in turn, we shape it, when we choose what to pay... See more

It could be said that the success of our human future requires the pursuit of narrative, reflection and empathy. To be sure, we can move in that direction through education, civic discourse and therapy. But if the design of our digital technologies helped us get to where we are, then design can also help get us somewhere better. Indeed, there are a

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the best software products aren’t just assemblages of functionality ,exposed by particular formal elements (links, buttons, icons, menus). Rather, they organize and shape how you think, and they create or sustain a particular lifestyle

Digital affordances seem to often constitute what Marshall McLuhan would call ‘hot media’ (1967), which require little active participation on the part of the audience, and are of highly predictable nature. Rosa would insist that to achieve resonance, we would want to cool media down to encourage active participation – a prerequisite for resonant... See more

Similarly, I think people need to ask themselves – and it might be easier if we ask each other – What do you really want to be doing? How did you fall in love in the first place? People start optimizing for things like “hm, if I did this I would get 5% more traffic” or “I would get to the next follower milestone” I think because it’s visible, and... See more