Why no paywall?

Substack includes the option of hiding content behind a paywall to encourage readers to set up paid subscriptions, but I won't be using this feature.

The main reason I set up the Another Angry Voice Substack was that social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter have been using content-hiding algorithms to prevent the majority of people who follow my accounts on there from seeing my content.

Typically Facebook only shows my posts to between 1% and 3% of the people who follow the page, then offers to "boost" the reach to about another 0.3% of my followers a time, for £12 a go.

My visibility on Twitter has also been dramatically reduced after Elon Musk brought in his policy of charging users for fake verification in order to artificially boost their reach.

Both platforms have adopted different versions of the same policy of profit-seeking by making content creators pay in order to reach their own audience.

I’m not planning on abandoning these platforms because it’s taken me years of hard work to build up over 400,000 followers, but it became obvious that I needed to diversify my online presence, and Substack is a good place to start because they don’t set up artificial barriers between content producers and their subscribers on here.

They do however include the option of putting content behind a paywall, by only making it available for paid subscribers.

I’ve decided that I’m not going to hide any of my articles about politics and economics behind the paywall for three main reasons:

The first is that I want my writing to reach as wide an audience as possible, so sticking things behind a paywall in order to drum up a few more paid subscriptions is obviously counter-productive to this main objective.

The second is that it would be absurd for me to complain about Facebook and Twitter setting up artificial barriers between me and my audience in order to extort cash out of me, only for me to set up artificial barriers between myself and my own audience in order to extort cash out of them.

The third is that I believe in the socialist principle of universality. I don’t want to set up financial barriers between myself and people who can’t afford £4 a month, because they’re working exploitative low-paid jobs, or living on the pittance of disability benefits, or whatever other circumstance might have forced them into economic difficulties.

So in light of these considerations I’m continuing with the Pay As You Feel principle that all of my work is free to access, but if anyone feels like supporting my work, and they can afford to do so without making sacrifices, they can set up a subscription to help me keep going.

If doing things this way means that a few people who can easily afford to support my work get to read it all for free without contributing, then so be it. That’s still preferable to denying access to my work to people who can’t easily afford it.

And if doing things this way means I make less money in paid subscriptions than I would by using paywall tactics, then so be it. That’s also preferable to denying access to my work to people who can’t easily afford it.

I will be putting up a few special "thank you" essays over the coming months for paid subscribers only, but all of my actual work on politics and the economy will continue to remain free, thanks to the amazing generosity of those who decide to support my work, despite knowing that they could just continue to read it for free.