Substack and Creativity

[dotinthesky]

It's been now 6 weeks since olamina came to visit Brazil. We had many interesting conversations during those days we spent together, mostly about our families and lives. Two of them have stayed with me.

The first one was about creativity, the energy we place into what we create and how we must be careful of what we bring into the world. I was in the midst of writing a first draft of a novel (for NaNoWriMo) - a horror novel - and it made me stop and think about my story, especially as it had demonic elements. In fact, a strange coincidence happened at the time. Just before Olamina and I went off to São Paulo for a long weekend, I wrote a passage in the novel that referenced a snake. When I got back, I discovered that one of my beloved pets had been killed by one.

At first I was really upset about this - even thinking I had somehow brought this about by "invoking" demonic elements. Took me about a month to get over his death and I've come to realise that part of grieving involves a little guilt. What if I had stayed behind with him? What if I had written something different?

I'm still going ahead with the novel and have started to delve more deeply into the symbolism around snakes. Grief as well: how can I add to my writing what I felt, since death goes hand in hand with horror? I guess I'm trying to make the best of it and learn from the experience, assimilating his loss and ultimately bringing some meaning into my novel - for the reader and myself.

The second chat we had was about the platform Substack. I was telling her about wanting to post more often on LJ, maybe even rebrand my account, and she suggested I try Substack instead. "You have so many stories to tell," she told me.

I already knew of Substack thanks to two writers, Hattie Crisell and George Saunders, who publish newsletters on creative writing. But I'd never stopped to consider creating one for myself. I started researching Substack, signing up to more accounts, and finally created a newsletter for myself.

I've been thinking since then about what I would write, how often I would publish, and if I should monetize. I've researched other writers, read articles in favour and against Substack. I've behaved like a typical Libra, weighing the pros and the cons. Finally, I decided I would launch it at the start of January, giving me this holiday break to tinker with it and get it ready.

Then news broke yesterday about Substack's decision not to remove or demonitize nazi content from its site. Damn... the nazis were one of the main reasons I left Twitter. This has thrown a clog in my plans and made me stop and rethink what I'm doing. Do I really want to send out a newsletter regularly? Do I want to commit to Substack and support a platform that encourages hate groups to proliferate? Do I care to play the monetization game? Should I maybe just log off and read a book?

Should I just post more regularly on Livejournal and leave it at that?

Comments

[livejournal.livejournal.com]

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[amw.livejournal.com]

I think if you are hoping to monetize your writing, then Substack or a platform like it is much better than LiveJournal. On the other hand, when you are on a platform that specifically is designed for people to monetize their writing, it changes your audience a bit too.

For example, i don't think i would ever read any of my LJ friends if they started journaling on Substack. In fact, one person i do know started writing about their travels on Substack and i haven't subscribed, because i don't want to "cross the streams".

I was one of the first readers on Substack because Bill Bishop is an investor in the company and Sinocism was the first major newsletter to migrate onto the site. Then the company took their VC money and forked out advances to an army of well-known political bloggers, some of whom i already read and thus were magically/creepily added to the pseudonymous account i used for Sinocism via email address linkage. Eventually i started unsubscribing from the writers who transitioned into publishing paywalled content that obnoxiously also included sponsored (?) segments pushing the platform's social features, instead of the original writing i was actually paying for.

The thing is, social features work on LJ because on LJ nobody is a journalist or a political blogger, we're all anonymous equals who write cozily about our personal lives. But on a platform that's literally founded to host elite political bloggers, the social features are more like shoehorning Twitter into what used to be a quiet, personal relationship. Nobody used to know or care what other blogs i read, least of all the bloggers themselves, but now apparently everyone has to know everything about what i read in my personal time. As a reader i feel shortchanged when i know my reading habits are being analyzed and sold back to writers as a marketing insight. My privacy has been compromised without my consent. I also find it offensive to be pushed to publicly "engage" with political blogs. If i wanted to get into performative political shitfights on the internet i would've joined Twitter in the first place.

So although i still read writers who publish through Substack, it's a transactional relationship, like i have with Amazon. I might go there sometimes to pay for something, but i don't see it as a place for making connections. I might be in the minority, though?

Anyway, the problematic nature of Substack was already evident right back from the very beginning when they paid advances to all kinds of right-wing and so-called centrist writers with reactionary views on trans people and other hot topics. The Very Woke made a point of abandoning Substack for other platforms years ago. I think one of them was called Ghost or something. End of the day, blogging platforms aren't rocket science. Dozens have come and gone over the past 25 years, so if or when the buzz of Substack fades, there will be plenty of other options. There already are plenty right now.

I guess the main question is if you want to go where the current buzz is... maybe that is still Substack for now? Certainly if you're looking to monetize your readership then it makes sense to go where there is an audience for whom subscribing to (and paying for!) another newsletter is just a one click exercise. You could try get people to pay for your content on LJ or set up a completely independent blog using Wordpress or something, plug in a Patreon or just a PayPal tip jar, but it'd probably take a lot more work to get noticed. It all comes down to your motivations for writing, i suppose.

[picosgemeos.livejournal.com]

Thanks for you thoughtful comment. You've touched on a few points I've been reflecting on since I posted here on LJ.

The truth is that I'm preferring to spend my writing time focussing on my novels and improving my skills. I was already finding it hard to commit to LJ though I would love to post here more often - and maybe that's a more doable project for me in the new year.

With Substack, I thought it might cater to friends who keep asking me: "what are you writing about? You never share with us." But I might as well just point them to LJ and spend a bit more time working on what I post here. Also, I think the element of monetization, which goes hand-in-hand with the gamefication of writing and self-marketing, does put me off a bit.

I agree with you that there is an equality here on LJ that is very appealing and sometimes there's content that is better than on Substack. I stumbled by accident on a retired person's journal, who lives in a remote area and is dealing with illness and having to move into an age-assisted accommodation. I found their writing more soulful and touching than most of the stuff by very well paid writers I've seen on Substack. I think the pressure to "perform" and deliver with those newsletters, where some have paid for, must be great and ultimately affect the quality of the writing (or at least it would for me!)

[olamina.livejournal.com]

I didn't know about Buttondown, when I suggested Substack..and of course my suggestion was pre-Nazi Nonsense (and always ever with an asterisk!). My hope with Substack is that you could share stories from your fascinating life. I was telling a friend about you the other day and he said your life sounded like a great/charming TV series. That friend would never join LJ but if I sent him a link to a blogpost or forwarded a newsletter, he'd be keen.

That said, you should do what moves you and "fills your cup". Everything isn't for everybody, and life is too short to feel like you have to constantly put ona show for others!

[picosgemeos.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I appreciate that - i'm grateful you believe in me. :)

I think what I'll do is put Substack on the back burner for now and wait a little longer, to see how things develop. Although the owners took the view now to allow monetization of dubious content, they seem like smart and thoughtful guys in many respects (at least they sound open to discussing things) and maybe it will all change.

In the meantime, I'm going to work on being more prolific here - so that when I feel more ready for Substack or Buttondown, I can switch over. I think part of my hesitation was feeling like I wasn't posting that much anyway, and having a newsletter was maybe going to backfire by forcing me to publish content I didn't feel was that great.

[naturalbornkaos.livejournal.com]

My God, I'm so very sorry to hear about what happened. I would be devastated. I think I would probably also blame myself and consider that I'd somehow invoked something, as crazy as that might sound to others.

I felt a vaguely similar way (about invocation, not guilt) a million years ago when I was writing Filth Kiss, that somehow reality and fiction were blending. I think I said at the time about the passage I was writing about the protagonists visiting their father's grave and how, a few days later, I visited mine for the first time and the atmosphere, everything, was identical and it felt really strange - like I'd somehow made it happen. I think at the time I definitely thought it was a positive thing - that somehow my creativity was aligning with real life and invoking I guess some kind of creative "spirit" rather than a "demonic" one but I think I would've been very guilty and terrified if I'd invoked something terrible that had happened.

(Weirdly, I explored these kinds of ideas a little in that short story I wrote - The Trending... It is definitely a line of thinking something that, although arguably superstitious, resonates deeply with me.)

As for what you should do with your writing, do whatever makes you feel the happiest. I have written nothing, nowhere for anyone other than myself (mostly just Facebook posts and a handful of LJ posts) this year and feel a lot better about writing as a result.

Particularly with social media, it's extremely freeing to not be trying to attract an "audience" - even just for the sake of making friends, rather than a commercial one. Perhaps this is more cockeyed magical thinking but I feel like if the right people are meant to find what you're writing, they will do regardless of where you put it. It's a lot easier to find a big audience that doesn't get you than it is to find one person who does.

[picosgemeos.livejournal.com]

Thanks my friend. It's interesting you mention The Trending as I've been thinking of this story lately! Basically, how this story would look if rewritten with A.I. in mind. I'm going to give it a re-read this afternoon.

I would probably also blame myself and consider that I'd somehow invoked something, as crazy as that might sound to others.

I felt very crazy, even looking out for other signs. And when I re-read the text I'd written, it almost sounded like it was channeling Paçoca's voice! Nutty.

the atmosphere, everything, was identical and it felt really strange - like I'd somehow made it happen

I've read an article recently on intuition and how aligned we are with "the powers that be", or the universe, when we are fully immersed in our creativity. Which is why I tried to find something good out of Paçoca's passing, for my own sake, and so I wouldn't lose my love for writing. If I ever manage to complete a readable draft of "Redbox" and share it with you and Sarah, I think you'll know exactly what passage I felt was an "invocation" when you get to it...

Particularly with social media, it's extremely freeing to not be trying to attract an "audience" - even just for the sake of making friends, rather than a commercial one

Yes, completely agree. Right now, I just want to perfect what I write, for myself, for my own enjoyment. That's really my only goal and anything additional is just a nice surprise.