Author: Seth Werkheiser

UNPROFITABLE PATHS

A fun question posed to Kareem Rahma, about deciding on a “generally unprofitable path,” to which Kareem replied:

“I waited until I was 33 and had worked a couple of corporate jobs. I knew if I failed I could always go back to corporate life. I also didn’t stop working when I decided to pursue the comedy career. I did both at the same time!”

This came up in two different conversations today, regarding the whole “doing the thing love” versus doing something safer, or which makes better money.

Most people I know who are doing “the cool thing” for a living have are doing it after decades of hard work. I don’t know anyone who started making music or art or whatever and like, two months later they could quit their full time job.

“Consistency is key. You can’t be in the right place at the right time without showing up consistently. You have to fail—and keep failing—until you succeed. People see Keep The Meter Running and SubwayTakes, but they don’t see the ten other failures that helped me get here.”

Kareem Rahma over at Feed Me.

JUST HITTING PUBLISH

I write about writing in ‘PUBLISH OFTEN AND TALK ABOUT YOUR WORK,’ over at my Social Media Escape Club:

Conversations, in varying “live” settings, sharpened my ideas and my ability to express them.

This is how Cory Doctorow can riff about horrible corporations for over an hour and make it look easy.

We can all do this if we stop spending five hours a day on our phones.

We lose in followers, but we gain by honing our craft, finding our unique ways to express the ideas and concepts that will resonate with the right people.

I coulda spent 10 more hours editing and re-writing, but I feel just getting the post out there help me write a clearer post at some point down the road. Maybe that’s next week, or three months from now.

NO SUCH THING AS A ‘NATURAL DISASTER’

Olivia Rafferty briefly met Ilan Kelman, a Professor of Disasters and Health at UCL, after her talk about Pop Music and Geology. They met recently:

When I sat down with Ilan, I asked him: “what is the one thing related to your research that you wish the wider public knew?” and he said, “there is no such thing as a ‘natural disaster.’ There is just nature.”

Listen to Olivia’s music right here:

NO COMMENTS

Someone asked me recently why I don’t have comments enabled on this blog.

It sort of goes back to this post by John Gruber who writes Daring Fireball: https://daringfireball.net/2010/06/whats_fair

And my hero Seth Godin: https://seths.blog/2006/06/why_i_dont_have/

“First, I feel compelled to clarify or to answer every objection or to point out every flaw in reasoning. Second, it takes way too much of my time to even think about them, never mind curate them.”

Getting caught up in some reply threads on Substack Notes is enough.

Then there’s comments on my individual posts on Substack. Not many, but a few.

Then the number of emails I reply to, as well.

I have a Discord, but I’m shutting that down.

So comments on my two blogs? I just don’t want to invite MORE, you know? I’m about at capacity!

I’m going to write more on this soon, how all the time we spend posting on social media leads us to spend more time on social media replying, checking notifications, responding to DMs… like, is there a better use of 2-3 hours per day?

Could spending 2-3 hours a day on writing, or playing guitar, or walking 10 miles a day be a better use of time?

HUNTERTHEN IS QUIETLY PERSISTENT ON BANDCAMP FRIDAY

Today is Bandcamp Friday, where Bandcamp waives their 15% fee of each digital purchase, putting more money into the pockets of artists.

To mark this occasion, I’ve made all my HUNTERTHEN music “pay what you want” for the day. Pay nothing, pay a dollar, pay $10, the choice is yours.

I’m a third generation musician. I joined my first band in high school playing my mom’s bass. But in recent years I just wanted to listen to music to fall asleep to, yet always had trouble finding the music that was just right. So I started making it myself, and have seven releases.

You can find my music in a few Noah Kalina videos, which is a huge honor for me.

HEAR MORE HUNTERTHEN HERE

MEET ME WHERE I AM

From Mario Fraioli of the The Morning Shakeout newsletter:

I’ve spent a lot of time this year thinking about and experimenting with how I want to use social media (Notes, IG, and Bluesky). And where I’ve landed after trying to maintain a consistent presence on these platforms and “meet people where they are” is that I just don’t think I want to use social media at all anymore.

I’ve seen this concept for years – “meet people where they are!”

What I’ve found is that I’m expected to become a regular on multiple platforms and engage with them every day. Every post, every like, every comment leads to more things to keep up with – the shares, the comments, the DMs. This is every day, spread across time zones, morning noon and into the night.

Always another post to reply to or share. Another commenter to reply to. Another DM to answer.

I think a lot of us are getting tired of meeting people where they are and stepping off the engagement rat race, as the benefits of playing the game just aren’t worth it anymore.

A lot of those those people we engage with on social media are content to just be on social media, without subscribing, without meeting us where we are.

There’s a time when the quirky eatery leaves the food court at the mall and sets up shop downtown, and I think that’s a lot of us right now.

EVIDENCE IS YOUR MARKETING

From my new post ‘YOUR EVIDENCE IS YOUR MARKETING‘ over at Social Media Escape Club:

“I saw someone marketing their music production services in text, outlining the discount, the expiration of the offer, and who might be interested.

No evidence, just details.

Their website showed the albums they worked, a display of musicians who trusted them with their art, their vision.

That’s evidence.”

From my time in the music industry, this was the foundation for so many bands in the metal and hardcore world. I didn’t find out about bands like Dillinger Escape Plan or Meshuggah from social media posts, I found out about them from friends who saw them and told me I need to hear them.

There was evidence; good sounding albums, word of mouth from their live shows. That was the marketing.

I know we’re in this always on / short form video world right now, but there are people out there making a living without being online 24/7 and without making short form videos.

I know a writer working on TV shows and they aren’t on social media. I know a musician with “just” 225 Patreon supporters and an email list and they’re making a living doing what they love.

Instead of trying to impress strangers, present your evidence to the right people in your own creative orbit.

LET PEOPLE FIND YOUR WEBSITE

If we can agree that we’re posting into the void on social media, why not just post on our own sites “into the void?”

I recently suggested a client add a blog to their website, and they sent me this:

“Literally within one week (of adding the blog) this led to an invitation to give a talk (you know the old-fashioned way, you introduce yourself to someone cool, they look you up, find your website and boom).”

If someone looks you up, and you’re on a social media platform and they don’t have an account, it’s very hard (or sometimes impossible) for them to see your work.

But every smart phone ships with a web browser. No one needs to have an account to view your website on the wide open internet.

When adding to your own website, you’re not posting into the void, you’re building an online archive.