My Substack experience has been so good that I’m now in a proselytizing frame of mind. I’ve been especially leaning on Robin Hanson to move Overcoming Bias, and Don Boudreaux to move Cafe Hayek. The only GMU blog that I would not confidently urge to switch is
Substack views itself as a newsletter rather than a blog, though. For example, it's extremely difficult to find old posts on substack. On a blog, that's a primary feature.
By the way, if you read in the Substack app (https://substack.com/app) or web inbox, you can also read any RSS there by importing it with "Add new RSS" at the bottom of the left-hand sidebar at https://substack.com/inbox.
Serious yet embarrassing question. What is even meant by "not having to go to a URL everyday and refresh the page"? My whole blog reading is experience consists in opening google, entering the page name and checking a couple of times on days I expect updates (or just whenever on sites which frequently post). I do this *even for substack pages* like ACX, Hannania and Caplan. Is there some other way to read blogs ad visit websites? (I am only 29 and I had (have?) no idea that there' another way to read blogs)
Are you accessing blogs via desktop, or via mobile device? If you'd like to save time navigating to multiple sites to check for updates, then you can use a third-party software application to grab the posts by site and/or author, then show them in a single reader. Download the app, enter the URL for the blog site, and that's pretty much all you have to do.
For my phone (Android), I use "Feeder" because it does not collect personal data and I can read offline. Other apps offer more features. Pick what you like.
Scott Alexander just had a post relating why so many of his readers may have preferred the old site for SSC and ACX more than the Substack - mostly for aesthetic reasons.
The 'thumbs up' button over on Overcoming Bias has been broken for, what, years now?
I use RSS for all these blogs. Unfortunately OB has also occasionally had issues where illegal character sequences ended up in the RSS feed, breaking it until it was either fixed or the posts with the illegal character sequences were old enough that they didn't appear in the recent posts given in the RSS feed.
My biggest issue with Substack is that if you try to turn off email notifications (for free subscriptions) it automatically unsubscribes you instead. I don't want ANY emails. I ONLY want to receive posts via RSS!
Thanks, I do use that already, but your suggestion is probably useful for anyone who didn't know.
My issue was really just that it seems unintuitive to me that for *paid* subscriptions, you can disable email notifications without it fully unsubscribing you. But for unpaid subscriptions (and BOI doesn't even offer paid subs!) disabling email notifications actually fully unsubscribes you.
I'll communicate your request to the relevant product team, though it might not get done quickly. For now, you could create a Gmail filter for Substack emails to go into a separate folder if you want them out of your main inbox.
I do have an email filter set up, and that works fine. I suppose I could just unsubscribe from BOI entirely, and still use the RSS feed to get updates. But then I would be missing from BOI's subscriber stats!
Funny, I I unsubscribe from all substack emails and just add them to my RSS app. I think that’s the path forward for a healthy distributed blogosphere; we just need to make blog RSS feeds as easy as podcasts, which also run on RSS.
Econlib should move. They also need some fresh blood on the writing staff and some of the lesser known writers should not be emailed every time they post but in some kind of bundle or weekly roundup.
Scott Sumner should move money illusion, and maybe write with a little more restraint, like in his econlib posts.
MR should NOT move. What Tyler has going is unique and wonderful.
As one of the first big "substackers" (I was once responsible for 50% of their paid subscriber base) I can say, at least for us, it was a terrible experience and they broke most of their promises, including continuing to charge us after we left their platform.
They've also been as borderline non-compliant as possible with the "you can always leave and take your readers" stuff -- e.g. they refuse to forward substack.com domains elsewhere, so all old links get broken, and they've set up link-tracking in emails in such a way that all old links in emails get broken too. It's hard to talk about this because mentioning it plays into Substack's hands in terms of people's fears when it comes to leaving!
I would really, really strongly recommend getting your own domain name, at the very least, so if you ever decide to leave you won't get a broken archive. But I would more broadly be wary of proseltyising Substack -- like I did once, it has come back to bite me.
I just moved my philosophy blog to substack. Seems good so far. The biggest downside is the loss of categories, for better archiving & retrieval of old posts.
Reader here, via RSS (Inoreader). I don't get it. Completely don't care if Substack vs. Wordpress but if you want to get creative about more static content I would imagine the latter has more options. Definitely wouldn't use an app for just one publishing platform.
>“Won’t charging a fee cost me readers?” Almost surely, but you aren’t required to charge anything - and I doubt you ever will be. The loss of goodwill would be too great for the platform to sustain.
I find the wording of that last sentence confusing. I subscribe to a fair number of Substacks. Some charge a subscription, some don't, and some have a mix of free and gated content.
Are you just saying that, in your opinion, the majority of writers ought not to charge?
Oh, that makes sense. Bryan is simply commenting on the possibility of Substack eliminating the free option and *requiring* writers to charge. That possibility seemed so remote that I didn't focus on it.
Substack views itself as a newsletter rather than a blog, though. For example, it's extremely difficult to find old posts on substack. On a blog, that's a primary feature.
As one of those marginal readers (I've largely stopped checking my RSS feeds frequently) I wish Marginal Revolution were on substack.
By the way, if you read in the Substack app (https://substack.com/app) or web inbox, you can also read any RSS there by importing it with "Add new RSS" at the bottom of the left-hand sidebar at https://substack.com/inbox.
I don’t refresh MR; I have it in my RSS reader! Substack takes on a little of the job of Google reader for me, but I still keep a lot in my Feedly.
Substack has native RSS support! just add /feed to the end of the address.
ex. https://betonit.substack.com/feed
Likewise. RSS is great, and I find it unfortunate that everything is expected to be on twitter instead nowadays.
Serious yet embarrassing question. What is even meant by "not having to go to a URL everyday and refresh the page"? My whole blog reading is experience consists in opening google, entering the page name and checking a couple of times on days I expect updates (or just whenever on sites which frequently post). I do this *even for substack pages* like ACX, Hannania and Caplan. Is there some other way to read blogs ad visit websites? (I am only 29 and I had (have?) no idea that there' another way to read blogs)
Are you accessing blogs via desktop, or via mobile device? If you'd like to save time navigating to multiple sites to check for updates, then you can use a third-party software application to grab the posts by site and/or author, then show them in a single reader. Download the app, enter the URL for the blog site, and that's pretty much all you have to do.
For my phone (Android), I use "Feeder" because it does not collect personal data and I can read offline. Other apps offer more features. Pick what you like.
Thanks! This is opening up a whole new world.
Scott Alexander just had a post relating why so many of his readers may have preferred the old site for SSC and ACX more than the Substack - mostly for aesthetic reasons.
https://astralcodexten.substack.com/p/why-do-people-prefer-my-old-blogs?s=r
The 'thumbs up' button over on Overcoming Bias has been broken for, what, years now?
I use RSS for all these blogs. Unfortunately OB has also occasionally had issues where illegal character sequences ended up in the RSS feed, breaking it until it was either fixed or the posts with the illegal character sequences were old enough that they didn't appear in the recent posts given in the RSS feed.
My biggest issue with Substack is that if you try to turn off email notifications (for free subscriptions) it automatically unsubscribes you instead. I don't want ANY emails. I ONLY want to receive posts via RSS!
Substack has native RSS support! just add /feed to the end of the address.
ex. https://betonit.substack.com/feed
Thanks, I do use that already, but your suggestion is probably useful for anyone who didn't know.
My issue was really just that it seems unintuitive to me that for *paid* subscriptions, you can disable email notifications without it fully unsubscribing you. But for unpaid subscriptions (and BOI doesn't even offer paid subs!) disabling email notifications actually fully unsubscribes you.
Just have your email client route all substack emails to a dedicated folder and mark as read, skipping the inbox.
I'll communicate your request to the relevant product team, though it might not get done quickly. For now, you could create a Gmail filter for Substack emails to go into a separate folder if you want them out of your main inbox.
Thanks! I appreciate it.
I do have an email filter set up, and that works fine. I suppose I could just unsubscribe from BOI entirely, and still use the RSS feed to get updates. But then I would be missing from BOI's subscriber stats!
Funny, I I unsubscribe from all substack emails and just add them to my RSS app. I think that’s the path forward for a healthy distributed blogosphere; we just need to make blog RSS feeds as easy as podcasts, which also run on RSS.
Econlib should move. They also need some fresh blood on the writing staff and some of the lesser known writers should not be emailed every time they post but in some kind of bundle or weekly roundup.
Scott Sumner should move money illusion, and maybe write with a little more restraint, like in his econlib posts.
MR should NOT move. What Tyler has going is unique and wonderful.
Maybe Cowen could synchronize the posting?
I dislike substack so I would say none.
As one of the first big "substackers" (I was once responsible for 50% of their paid subscriber base) I can say, at least for us, it was a terrible experience and they broke most of their promises, including continuing to charge us after we left their platform.
They've also been as borderline non-compliant as possible with the "you can always leave and take your readers" stuff -- e.g. they refuse to forward substack.com domains elsewhere, so all old links get broken, and they've set up link-tracking in emails in such a way that all old links in emails get broken too. It's hard to talk about this because mentioning it plays into Substack's hands in terms of people's fears when it comes to leaving!
I would really, really strongly recommend getting your own domain name, at the very least, so if you ever decide to leave you won't get a broken archive. But I would more broadly be wary of proseltyising Substack -- like I did once, it has come back to bite me.
The only problem with Substack is the SEO - when I search 'betonit', your betonit.blog site is the top result. The substack is the 5th result.
David Friedman should
I just moved my philosophy blog to substack. Seems good so far. The biggest downside is the loss of categories, for better archiving & retrieval of old posts.
Reader here, via RSS (Inoreader). I don't get it. Completely don't care if Substack vs. Wordpress but if you want to get creative about more static content I would imagine the latter has more options. Definitely wouldn't use an app for just one publishing platform.
I just use RSS so I don't mind as long as your blog supports it.
>“Won’t charging a fee cost me readers?” Almost surely, but you aren’t required to charge anything - and I doubt you ever will be. The loss of goodwill would be too great for the platform to sustain.
I find the wording of that last sentence confusing. I subscribe to a fair number of Substacks. Some charge a subscription, some don't, and some have a mix of free and gated content.
Are you just saying that, in your opinion, the majority of writers ought not to charge?
I understood it as:
The loss for goodwill on the part of substack if they required authors to charge a fee (presumably to make a buck themselves)
Oh, that makes sense. Bryan is simply commenting on the possibility of Substack eliminating the free option and *requiring* writers to charge. That possibility seemed so remote that I didn't focus on it.