Digest 4/5/2021

The great Substackening, the line between criticism and harassment, and more.

WHAT MEDIUM SAYS ABOUT THE MEDIA INDUSTRY

Ah, Medium. It’s like an algorithm vomited up a composite of everything wrong with the media industry and then some shithead built a media company around it. Casey Newton’s deep-dive on the turmoil within the company made me think of the company’s billionaire founder Ev Williams: how can someone be so wrong yet so rich? (Though this is no mystery to me, having worked for a very stupid billionaire). 

Williams announced in a blog post two weeks ago that the company will pivot away from publications and offer buyouts to the entire editorial staff. This new pivot comes just about two years after a pivot to a subscription and membership model wherein the company launched a handful of publications staffed by professional journalists in hopes of raking in subscriptions. But publications are now passé, it seems. 

 Here’s a quick rundown of the “mess at Medium,” per Newton:

— Williams opted for the pivot and buyouts supposedly because the work of Medium’s publications wasn’t converting readers into paid subscribers, as he’d hoped. But Williams had never really invested in the journalists who ran those publications; they weren’t given the promotional efforts they needed to succeed, and they weren’t given time to reach an audience outside Silicon Valley. Williams quickly grew frustrated with the cost of running them and started cutting costs just about a year into the launch. “We were set up to fail,” one former employee told Newton. 

— Instead of investing in those publications run by staff, Williams jumped on board with that cherished industry trend of powering a media company with underpaid labor from freelancers. He launched “Amplify,” a program that gives writers a small fraction of subscription revenue based on readership. He also tried shelling out bigger sums to established writers like Susan Orlean to blog on the platform, but those rates paled in comparison to Substack’s massive advances.

— Now, the company is seemingly making a full pivot to focus on user-generated content, which a skeleton editorial staff will stay on to promote. The company will continue to use Facebook and Google traffic to attempt converting hits to paid subscribers, and is acquiring an e-book company to generate more evergreen content. 

A single clueless billionaire with no real strategy is calling the shots, and is jumping wildly from thing to thing at the drop of a hat. He can’t even seem to decide what exactly Medium is — is it a blogging platform? Is it a bundle of publications? What are users paying for, exactly? Does anyone know?? The only thing he seems absolutely sure of is that unions are bad. Now he seems to be making a haphazard pivot prompted by the journalist-as-influencer economy, exemplified by the rise of Substack. But what journalist-influencers on Medium are going to drive subscriptions? Substack is working because it’s paying popular writers massive advances to leave their prestigious jobs. All of this chaos seems like yet another letter of recommendation for worker-owned media.

Substack, meanwhile, will only continue to grow. The company is raising $65 million in new venture capital funding, an effort spearheaded by current investor Andreessen Horowitz. This puts the company’s value at around $650 million. Given the latest splash of controversy, I predict a good deal of the money will go towards a conspicuous investment in more diverse writers (you know, to balance out the disproportionate representation of “anti-woke” shitheads). Maybe they’ll try to draw in some trans writers in an attempt to alleviate concerns over platforming the likes of Greenwald and Singal. Substack seems to have found the winning formula. Get a bunch of VC money and throw it at money-makers who are sure to succeed. Repeat. 

So I predict Medium will try some version of this, if Williams can stomach the upfront cost. I’m not sure how many pivots Medium has left in its arsenal, but mark my words, the next (last?) one will be to Substack mimicry. (Twitter is one step ahead here, having acquired newsletter company Revue). Media companies all seem doomed to mirror the latest industry trend in some flailing attempt to save journalism, because the industry is propped up by rich idiots whose primary goal is making boatloads of money fast rather than scaling sustainably and treating its employees well. Pivot to video! Mine clicks from Facebook and Google! Reader engagement! Eliminate editors and give superstar reporters a blog! Eliminate publications and replace them with blogs? Sure, worth a shot, I guess.

COMINGS AND GOINGS

• Lovia Gyarkye joins the Hollywood Reporter as arts and culture critic. 
• CNN announced two new hires — Katie Bo Williams on the intelligence and national security beat, and Gabby Orr on the Republican beat. 
• ProPublica’s eight new hires include former GQ investigative reporter Doug Bock Clark, LA Times staff writer Nicole Santa Cruz, and Marshall Project staff writer Eli Hager. 
• Frank Bruni will no longer be a columnist for the New York Times, but will continue to contribute to the Opinion section as he joins Duke University. 

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EVERYTHING ELSE

— What’s the difference between criticism and harassment? Glenn Greenwald and Michael Tracey maintain that Greenwald quote-tweeting less powerful media workers with fewer followers — essentially unleashing his followers on them — is simply criticism, and journalists who complain about harassment are whiny babies.  

— After her colleagues rallied around her, the Washington Post lifted a ban that prevented journalist Felicia Sonmez from covering sexual misconduct stories; the paper claimed that allowing Sonmez to this kind of reporting would pose a conflict of interest, since Sonmez herself has publicly accused a man of sexual misconduct. 

— My unhinged talk show queen Drew Barrymore is launching a magazine?!?! Will Drew be the new O? Will Drew be the new Medium?? Barrymore recognizes it’s not the most intuitive time to launch a print magazine, but the publisher said it will focus on the “consumer revenue stream” rather than advertising, giving it a better chance at success.

— Lyz Lenz interviewed Talia Lavin about online harassment for her newsletter, in which Lenz also discusses her own experience with vicious, frightening harassment and doxxing. Makes you wonder why anyone would want to be a journalist, on top of everything else!!! Also, seems like publications should follow Defector’s lead and codify some kind of procedure in the event a freelancer is the victim of harassment.

— Apparently VICE is in “advanced talks” to go public after merging with 7GC & Co Holdings, a special purpose acquisition company. What could go wrong??