The future of social media: small, private gardens

by Elizabeth Tai 

Have you heard? Twitter is imploding and may disappear.

A couple of weeks ago, the idea of Twitter collapsing didn’t even occur to me. However, thanks to the wild managerial decisions of one over-entitled billionaire, advertisers are fleeing Twitter and the platform is slowly breaking down because the people that used to maintain it have been fired. 

There's a real possibility that Twitter may cease to exist in a matter of weeks.

(If you’re wondering what in the world is going on, you can read my essays Twitter Meltdown Part 1 and Part 2)

For authors, Twitter was a way to promote their books and connect with readers, authors and industry players. Where can they go if Twitter collapses?

That’s the question you should ponder soon but let me first steer you to a quiet, barely-noticed movement that is changing social media.

In the last few months, I’ve been stumbling on more and more writers who are moving away from their blogs to write elsewhere. Many say that they just “want to write more freely”. 

Once upon a time, that place was blogs. I'm sure you've heard about the oft-dished-out advice: Don't build your home on rented land. A website is "owned land". But many have come to realise that Google is increasingly prioritising advertising dollars. Writers have to write a certain way or risk being penalised and buried in Google search. And there's nothing more creativity-sapping than to abide by rigid rules on how content should be.  

 

People are getting tired of having their distribution channels dictated by the rules of the few.  So, they are now moving on to platforms that enable them to take more control of how they can reach their followers and readers.

So there's a move from corporation-controlled platforms to walled, private gardens or networks.  The main appeal of these tools is that they are not algorithm-driven. Meaning, whether your content gets seen or not does not depend on the platform’s distribution rules of the day. Because, there are no rules.

Of all the tools like that out there, Substack appeals to writers and artists the most. 

Substack's rise

Substack is a popular online tool used by millions of creators to send newsletters. But that oversimplifying it. If a blog and an email marketing tool had a baby, the result will be Substack. 

Substack appealed to many writers because they get to own  their mailing lists and yet are provided tools to build a community. Unlike other social media channels, it didn't have an algorithm-driven discovery engine. Instead, writers recommend Substacks to each other.

For almost a year, I used Substack as a glorified mailing list to notify people of new posts on my blog. My main motivation then was to move out of Mailerlite's clunky interface. Also, it appealed to my frugal heart: I could send out newsletters to my readers free.

But I have since realised that I’ve been woefully underutilising Substack’s capabilities. In the last few weeks, I've pivoted, turning my newsletter, now named Tai Tales, into a hub where people can interact with me and get my fiction, essays and updates about my work. It's also a place where I can find other writers and finally be a part of a community.

Yes, I'm actually publishing my fiction there! To my delight, there's a growing number of fiction writers sharing their novels chapter by chapter. I'm planning to do the same. 

Writers like Elle Griffin, for example, shared chapters of her novel Obscurity weekly. After the novel ended its run, she released it as an ebook and also mailed a beautiful hardcover version to top tier subscribers. I love this personalised approach to novel creation.

Recently, I've re-published my horror short story, Blood of Nanking, in time for Halloween. I plan to publish many of the short stories that have stayed neglected in my hard drive. Finally, they can get out there into the world.

I’ve never felt freer as a writer, more energised. For so long, blogging or writing my novel, felt like shouting into the void. It was such a lonely, demotivating experience and I almost wanted to just quit. Here, I get to organically build my audience, interact with fellow writers while getting feedback on my writing.

And as a reader? Boy, I’m really thrilled by the content I’ve been reading from fellow writers. I realised how much effort it was to find content like this on Google search.  Why? Because this content did not fit into the rigid SEO framework set out by Google, so they are buried under heaps of marketing material.

Like so many creatives, I’ve come to the conclusion that the world wide web no longer belongs to the common people — especially artists. It has not been for a long while. The latest Google update only cements the fact that corporations and ad dollars will continue to dominate search engine results.

Aren't you tired of listicles and marketing-slanted content? Don't you long for out-of-the-box, human, raw writing? I miss the words of ordinary Joes and Janes. Don't you wish you didn't have to do all the things to reach even one reader? Substack is giving me this opportunity to write and savour them once more. 

I believe we’ve reached a crossroads in the social media/Internet space. What I call the “fed up” point. The Twitter meltdown is probably the last straw for many. Users want alternatives. They want more control over their data. They want to be free of the domination of billionaires and corporations. They want  to stop wading through a algorithm-manipulated feed to find content they want to read. And they want freedom to create spaces where they can reach their audiences without jumping through hoops. 

More than ever, there’s an urgent need for a service or a platform that is free of “algorithmically curated feeds” that won’t reduce our visibility.  

So the question you need to answer is this: Are you ready for the change?

Elizabeth writes Tai Tales, a Substack where she shares essays, flash fiction and short stories. She will be serialising her three-novel series, Distant Stars, in 2023.