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I don't see how they can avoid going down the same path as Quora, Medium, and others. At the end of the day, they are for-profit entities, and not only that, bu
by asciident 6y ago
I don't see how they can avoid going down the same path as Quora, Medium, and others. At the end of the day, they are for-profit entities, and not only that, but they are startups which means they are after growth and need to eventually N-fold their profits year-after-year in some future. They need to grow faster than the S&P index plus a healthy premium for risk, in order for investments to make sense.
I don't think anyone at Medium thought their service was better for their users by putting up paywalls, requiring accounts, and broadening their SEO by soliciting contributions. But they need to grow either in users or in profits, and there's only a certain number of ways you can squeeze money from internet readers.
- burlesona 6y agoSubstack has a different and fundamentally better business model. They make money when newsletter authors charge subscribers. This means they are aligned with helping newsletter authors create and host amazing newsletters. I think this gives them a much better chance of serving authors rather than serving advertisers.
- cblconfederate 6y agoOr just clickbait newsletters. Because let's face it, subscriptions correlate with traffic. Besides "awesome" content always had the Patreon alternative. Integrating the two together might be of value, but i dont think they 'll avoid the issues.
- zorked 6y agoIs it though? I click a lot of clickbait because I am human. I don't think I give a lot of direct money to clickbaiters. It is a hell of a mountain to climb before I feel compelled to go grab the credit card and type all those numbers.
- intended 6y agoThe basic premise of almost all internet firms - at enough N, 0.01% is profitable. The long tail guarantees that people mash that dopamine grabbing button.