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vgr's profile
Venkatesh Rao
Venkatesh Rao
Venkatesh Rao
@vgr

Tweets

Venkatesh Rao

@vgr

Conversational account. For work follow @ribbonfarm, @breaking_smart, @artofgig. Tweets are 90% vacuous views, apathetically held. Mediocritopian. IKEA builder.

Los Angeles, CA
venkateshrao.com
Joined August 2007

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    1. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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      The one wildcard in this picture is where static sites will go -- gatsby, jekyll etc. I've now been on the sidelines of one pretty ambitious static site (http://yakcollective.org ) and developed a better appreciation of the potential there, but definitely not for pure writers

      2 replies 0 retweets 7 likes
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    2. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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      Still rounding out the views I put forth in my text renaissance post earlier this year, and might potentially use the ideas to expand the longform course on teachable so I can make money off all this content industry prognisticationhttps://www.ribbonfarm.com/2020/02/24/a-text-renaissance/ …

      1 reply 1 retweet 6 likes
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    3. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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      This is my art of longform course. I need about 2-3 weeks uninterrupted time to record a 2x expanded version covering all this new stuff, but haven't been able to find the time. I don't think I'll have the time to run a live cohort, which would be ideal. https://ribbonfarm.teachable.com/p/the-art-of-longform …

      1 reply 0 retweets 6 likes
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    4. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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      Venkatesh Rao Retweeted mrgunn

      This is a good point. WordPress violates my platform point by... simply not being a platform at all. It is featureset optimal, can be low cost (if you self host and have low traffic) and high variance.https://twitter.com/mrgunn/status/1328800252141334528 …

      Venkatesh Rao added,

      mrgunn @mrgunn
      Funny how bluechecks never ruined blogging, or even WordPress. This is how having a brand cuts both ways. https://twitter.com/vgr/status/1328789670570848258 …
      1 reply 0 retweets 7 likes
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    5. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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      I think this is because Automattic failed at making wordpress dot com a true platform level competitor to things like Medium. It never outgrew roots as basically an open source product rather than a platform. What it actually competes with are hosted WP players like WPengine

      1 reply 0 retweets 8 likes
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    6. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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      I've been on WPEngine a long time, happily paying premium to not have to think about the headaches of self-admin'ed WP. But hosted WP is not a platform and can never be. The tech is fundamentally a digital mansion. At most you can create a feudal landscape of mansions. Not a city

      1 reply 0 retweets 6 likes
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    7. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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      This article has apparently been doing the rounds ht @noupsidehttps://www.cjr.org/special_report/substackerati.php …

      2 replies 0 retweets 5 likes
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    8. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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      Will read and comment later on this thread. Stopping for some Real Work™

      1 reply 0 retweets 4 likes
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    9. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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      Ok, read it. Kinda meh. The writer kinda doesn't get it I think. The choice to center the kind of writer who is hoping to go to a secure paid gig at the same level of effort, lower risk, and more pay, is not really the interesting kind of writer for the future.

      1 reply 0 retweets 10 likes
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    10. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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      Like many rearview mirror analysis, the writer is looking at this through the lens of old media and the unexamined assumption that the same people must succeed on the new medium, for the same kinds of value/recognition. Begging the question basically.

      1 reply 0 retweets 7 likes
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      Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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      If you assume the status hierarchies of the old world must self-evidently be sustained in the new world, of course you'll reach the conclusion that that is what will happen. The problem is there may soon be no "traditional" world for people "passing through" substack to aspire to

      1:07 PM - 17 Nov 2020
      • 6 Likes
      • _ Rahul Ramchandani Alex Schleber 👽😷 Matt Kent mutual Based Prophet of the Lethe River
      1 reply 0 retweets 6 likes
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        2. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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          If you've been substacking with the hope of getting a NYT op-ed gig... you are kinda missing the whole point. The point is that utopian destination is increasingly not a tenable one at all and its own top people are abandoning ship. So this sort of thing is "it."

          1 reply 1 retweet 14 likes
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        3. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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          Also, I'd like to know how many fires I have on their 1-4 fire scale. I'm guessing a 1-fire.

          1 reply 0 retweets 7 likes
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        4. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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          My unsolicited top-3 advice items: 1. Stay the course focusing on writers over readers 2. Avoid cross-promotion 3. Build more individual writer branding tools and push tech into the background. Avoid temptation of making the platform the brand.

          2 replies 0 retweets 20 likes
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        5. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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          Basically the product would benefit from being more product-driven. True north is not NYT but WordPress. Deeper, more feature-ful product, more customizable for all. Definitely do NOT create 2 classes of writers (rating system is fine, different feature sets starts to get dicey)

          2 replies 0 retweets 9 likes
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        6. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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          tldr of strategy recommendation for substack: commoditize your complement, ie writers to the tune of 90% but not 100%. Putting all writer brands on an equal level playing field instead of creating *feature* tiers for bluechecks is the key to being a good platform.

          2 replies 0 retweets 7 likes
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        7. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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          There is no royal road to geometry There is no special iPhone for special people, everybody gets the same price points. No special substack for special writers. But fee tiers for ++ services are okay. Like the extra fee for own domain mapping.

          1 reply 0 retweets 5 likes
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        8. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Nov 17
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          Venkatesh Rao Retweeted Eric Richards

          This is possibly a problem for history-completist readers, but is frankly not a big deal for me. I'd be fine with most of my content just vanishing into random blackholes so long as I've gotten what I want out of creating it.https://twitter.com/EricRichards22/status/1328812337785081857 …

          Venkatesh Rao added,

          Eric Richards @EricRichards22
          We just need to go back to blogs. This cycle keeps happening, and all of this content is going to end up in abandoned silos. https://twitter.com/vgr/status/1328789670570848258 …
          1 reply 0 retweets 7 likes
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        9. End of conversation

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