why i am skeptical that substack can or should replace legacy media

in light of recent developments at my workplace and a recent argument with some guy online, i’ve been thinking a little bit about the idea that substack (or some platform like it) could serve as a replacement for “legacy” media (or really any publication with certain institutional safeguards in place, e.g., editors, fact-checkers, and enough resources to support serious reporting). (i’m dispensing with capitalization from hereon out, or at least for as long as i feel like it, in recognition of the patent truth that this is nothing more than a place to blog and the following is nothing more than a blog post.)

as i’ve said on this wretched platform before, i am highly sympathetic to the idea that there are problems, to put it mildly, with the existing structure of magazine and newspaper publishing. (in short: it is very bad that rich patrons always have the option of interfering in the editorial workings of a publication. i worked at the new republic when it was essentially decimated by its then-patron, chris hughes, and i now work at the washington post, which….well, you know. so i’m highly sensitive to the idea that oligarchs will, inevitably, use their power to override editorial decisions. but i’m not sure how else newspapers and magazines could be structured. i don’t think the market is a reliable indicator or safeguard of value—see how much more money colleen hoover books make than whatever your preferred title of quality is, or see a thousand other obvious examples—and i don’t think media could safely become a public utility while serving its perhaps foremost function as a watchdog of public institutions. none of this means that i think the oligarch model is the winner, but all of it means that i’m at a loss as to how things could be improved, not just in practice but even in the airy realm of what political philosophers call “ideal theory.” i welcome dialogue and reading suggestions.) i’m also sympathetic to the idea that substack is, after all, just a platform, and that it could (and does) host publications that are basically structured in the same ways that legacy media is. a publication hosted on substack could employ fact-checkers and editors and staff writers, but then many of the same questions that i just quarantined in parentheses would recur, and many of the nominal advantages of substack (independence or whatever) would vanish.

what i mean to contest here, then, is the idea that the “substack model”— in which a bunch of rogue losers write their little screeds and send them off into the world without any kind of editorial oversight—can or should compete with the “legacy model”—in which a publication with some sort of quality control gathers many different voices in one centralized location. (some publications that follow the “legacy model” are in fact hosted on substack. these just count as legacy media for me, and i don’t mean to neg them.) although i’m increasingly pessimistic that people who are determined to misunderstand you/incapable of understanding you (see, again, this dust-up) can be be effectively pre-empted, i’m going to do my best to be extremely clear about why i think substack is not a viable alternative. (which is OF COURSE not to say that substack is good for nothing. i’ll get to what i think it’s good for in due course.)

there are different kinds of “legacy” publications that serve different functions. for ease of rebutting any contrarians who congregate in the comments, i will number the functions that i think legacy publications perform that substack (or whatever blogging/newsletter-sending platform you prefer) cannot perform.

1. newspapers like the washington post and magazines like the new yorker publish reporting. they also publish opinion pieces and criticism, which are not the same as reporting. (recent events have demonstrated that this distinction is not as obvious as i assumed it to be.) at many legacy publications, sections that publish reporting are isolated from the sections that publish opinions. (please, if you are a contrarian type, resist the impulse to insist that actually all reporting is infused with opinion, man. that’s true, to some extent, but that doesn’t mean that neutrality in reporting is not an ideal worth striving for, any more than the tragedy that everyone sins all the time means we should give up on aspiring to goodness. even if you think that any given newspaper has not achieved neutrality in reporting, that too does not mean that neutrality in reporting is not a good worth aiming at.) criticism and opinion writing do not, to my mind, require as many resources as reporting does, at least in a straightforward sense, so perhaps they are more likely to flourish on substack (although in subpoints 2 and 3, i will note some reasons to be skeptical that even these sorts of writing are apt to be as good on substack as they are in magazines or newspapers).¹ criticism requires, minimally, a book, a writing device, and some time. reporting requires, minimally, a lot of money, a number of dedicated fact-checkers, and, in certain dangerous situations, material protections, such as bullet proof vests. while it is not impossible that someone indepedently wealthy with a number of freelance fact-checkers on retainer and a private security detail in tow could produce good reporting without the backing of some kind of instution, it is unlikely. it is additionally unlikely that a total maverick would be able to produce the kind of large-scale investigations that many reporters collaborate to produce at places like the NYT and the washington post. for these reasons, it seems all but certain that the volume of decent reporting that will appear on a place like substack will never match that produced at a place like [insert the newspaper or magazine that you like best here]. (the point of this is not to say that the washington post in particular is producing great reporting, although i happen to think it is. you can disagree with this particular conclusion and still agree with the general point i’m making, which is that good reporting requires more resources than one guy typing alone tends to have at his disposal.)

2. although criticism and opinion writing do not require the same kind of material support that reporting does, they are still improved by fact-checking and, above all, editing. not only does editing make writing better most of the time: editing also serves a gate-keeping function. editors say no to stuff that sucks and improve stuff that doesn’t suck, which is why, if you pick a piece at random from a magazine like the drift [or whatever magazine you think is good], it is likely to be significantly better than a piece picked at random from the whole of substack. the reverse can also hold. if you know that you hate the sensibility of a particular magazine or newspaper, you can generally predict that most of the writing in it will annoy you. with substack, you’re going in totally blind. i’m sure some particular pieces of writing on substack are better than some particular pieces of writing in the drift [or whatever magazine you think is good], but in general, writing in magazines that is vetted by literally anyone is better than writing that is not. again: there is some great writing on substack. but it takes a lot more work to find and is, i think, much rarer. if you’re wondering if i think your writing—yes, your writing—on substack is great, i do :) but everyone else, not so much

3. not only do magazines and newspapers tend to contain better writing; they also tend to make for a less irritating reading experience, because they centralize different pieces in one convenient place. i recently complained on the ‘notes’ feature of this wretched platform that there are too many substacks, and it’s true. i dread the experience of opening my inbox and seeing fifteen different emails from fifteen different newsletters. (so sorry to have saddled you with this one! so sorry if i don’t actually open the emails i receive from your substack!) i feel dread even when the emails are from writers that i like whose substacks are reliably good. in contrast, i enjoy the experience of taking my copy of harper’s (or whatever) to the cafe and simply reading through it. reading a good newspaper or a magazine is like living in a city-state in which all your amenities are within walking or at least driving distance. reading around on substack is like boarding a plane to get to the grocery store.

4. finally, a completely anecdotal and experiential datum: when i know i am writing For Publication and/or for an editor i trust, i do a better job. i have yet to bring myself to write an actual essay for substack. if you read my published work and you are a Person of Taste (tm), you will by now have noted that it is immeasurably better than the stuff i dash off on here. that’s because i find it hard to think of substack as anything other than….a blog. it’s where i go to rant. i save my considered thoughts for essays or books i intend to publish. not everyone is like me, of course. but i think a lot of writers are.

this does not mean that i hate substack or that i think that it is worthless. substack is like only fans for writers. it allows people who don’t know each other to develop parasocial relationships with one another (is this a good thing? i think so), and it allows writers who are actually friends with one another to socialize digitally (it appears to be replacing twitter in that respect). also, there is something pleasing about reading writing that is raw and unpolished and maybe kind of bad; the feel of substack reminds me of the feel of tumblr in 2010 or something. it’s a cute and earnest online commons, with a sprinkling of weird contrarian freaks (more on them below) who kind of harsh the vibe. and to be sure, occasionally, writing that is excellent but too weird or niche to be published elsewhere is published here. and equally occasionally, writing that is good in a totally mainstream way is published here. substack shouldn’t be abolished, or something. it just is clearly not the solution to all that ails legacy media.

finally, i would be remiss if i failed to note that many (although not all!!!!!! emphatically not all!!!!!!!!) of the people who think substack is a viable alternative to ‘real publications’ are fucking annoying contrarian types who hate anything mainstream solely because it’s mainstream. such people are basically in the business of conspiciously performing that they are uniquely knowing by rejecting things that “the libs” like, which can often lead them to embrace desperately edgy and embarassing shit, like [redacted because i don’t want to alienate more of my audience than i have to]. defining yourself in aggrieved and resentful opposition to the libs is just as lazy and predictable as being a lib (in the deragatory, in-this-house sense). this sort of person is apt to like substack because they really want you to know that they’re too in the know to like the same shit that boomer moms like. but there are worst fates than being boomer-mom-adjagent, and spending your life writing angry substacks in an effort to prove that you are superior to boomer moms is emphatically one of them.

1. arguably, and not implausibly, there is some less straightforward sense in which they require just as many resources, albeit of a different kind. good criticism requires time to read and meditate—and also, perhaps, a good liberal arts education, reading proficiency in two if not more languages, intellectually stimulating interlocuters, etc, etc.