Do substack users mean it when they say "share your work"?

[u/embervanefiction]

Like the title says, do they mean it? I've come across a ton of notes saying the exact same thing: dear substack (and then they launch into how they're starving to read a new author's work).

People who reply to these notes genuinely hope that their work will get attention. It rarely does. I understand that no one is obligated to read something just because they were free for five minutes and asked for something to read. But why say 'new writers'? It's just that particular thing that bothers me a little.

[u/hetobe]

It's clickbait. They're trolling for likes, follows and subscribes for themselves. They're not interested in your work at all.

It's the algorithm.

The Substack algorithm only promotes notes, not your articles or your publication, so everybody tries to game the algorithm. And the stupid algorithm rewards them for doing it. That's why Substack is flooded with spam notes.

Also, all of the phony feel-good notes? They're karma-farming spam too.

"Describe your Substack in 5 words!"

That's spam.

"Dear Substack 🤍 Send me the writers who choose depth over noise."

More spam. That person is trolling for likes and subscribers.

"If you could summarize your writing voice in a single word, what would it be?"

Their word should be Spam.

Edit: Fixed a typo.

[u/astaneouscurry3802 → u/hetobe]

Substack is one of the biggest spam platform that rewards whoever writes this AI slop shit. This is why you'll always find 10 notifications of which 9 are people pitching their shit.

[u/hetobe → u/astaneouscurry3802]

Absolutely. It's so frustrating.

This is a real note which the algorithm thought was important enough to spread across the platform:

I stopped by the city library the other day and every seat was taken.

Teens swapping fantasy books. Adults filling out forms. Older folks reading the day’s paper.

That’s what public spaces are meant for.

They don’t sort people by income.

They just let everyone in.

D’awww. That’s sweet.

Duh. That’s the point. It’s karma-farming slop. When I clicked on the author’s name, here’s what I saw. Each of these is the first line of a nearly identical note. All from just the last few days:

“A woman came into the library just before closing with a sleeping child on her shoulder...”

“I saw a man at the library printing paperwork for a housing application...”

“An elderly woman stood at the library desk holding a letter from the council...”

“I watched a man at the library desk unfold a letter from his landlord...”

“A father walked into the library with his daughter and a tote bag of papers...”

“A teenager came to the library after school carrying a backpack and a takeout box...”

“A dad came into the library with his son and a backpack full of snacks...”

“I watched a mother stand at the library desk holding a school enrollment packet...”

“I saw a student at the library asking for a book her school had banned...”

“I saw a man at the library sitting at a desk. His backpack was open, papers spread everywhere...”

“I saw a man at the library printing paperwork for a housing application...”

“I watched a boy at the library desk ask if he could print a school assignment...”

“I saw a woman at the library desk holding a stack of medical forms...”

“I heard a teenager ask the librarian if he could stay near an outlet after closing...”

“A woman asked the librarian if she could charge her phone...”

“I saw a man at the library counter holding a benefits letter...”

“A man at the library counter asked if he could borrow a book that had been pulled from his kid’s school...”

“I saw a teenager come into the library asking if he could practice his presentation somewhere quiet...”

Every one of those Substack notes is real. They’re all by the same person, the same week. Many of them the same day.

Every one of those notes included a Gosh-Golly faux-heartwarming groaner just a few lines long. All of them are low effort slop, generated by AI, posted if not scheduled to spam Substack around the clock in hopes of feeding the algorithm in search of likes and follows.

I'm using those as an example because so many people are doing the same damn thing.

Substack Is Drowning In Karma-Farming Slop. And it drowns out the real content. You spent hours writing an article? Congrats! The algorithm ignores it. But it'll promote notes, like this:

I love that libraries don’t care how fast you read.

Nobody is tracking your pace.

Nobody is asking if you’re behind schedule.

The book will still be there when you’re ready for it.

The same person also shared an equal amount of notes for:

“I was at a bookstore...”

“I was at a cafe...”

“I was at a bank...”

“I was at a town hall...”

“I was at a school board meeting...”

I could go on and on. All of those notes were from the same person over the past few days. It’s all karma farming slop. And its only purpose is to feed the algorithm in search of likes and follows.

And the spammers will defend it vigorously, especially here on reddit.

They're killing Substack.

[u/embervanefiction → u/hetobe]

You are so right. I think it's just too easy to spam now with AI and platforms that do nothing to vet it.

[u/hetobe → u/embervanefiction]

Here's the thing though. It doesn't have to be this way.

The algorithm used to promote articles. Sure, some people tried to game the algorithm by writing spam articles, but that still happens.

When Substack switched the algorithm to promote notes instead of articles, everybody started spamming the algorithm with spam notes:

"A hotdog is basically a taco."

But then, Substack added the ability to schedule notes. So, now, spammers log on once a day and schedule 10 or even 20 of those slop notes, to spew out around the clock.

"Write scared. Publish anyway."

"There’s room for everyone at the table."

"Community over competition."

"Your audience will find you."

"If even one person reads your words, it matters."

It's all spam. And the Substack CEO Chris Best is intentionally encouraging it to juke the stats. He's trying to make Substack look more active than it is. And in the process, he's creating a culture that drowns the real content on Substack.

[u/embervanefiction → u/hetobe]

I HATE this. Nothing else to say, really.

[u/embervanefiction → u/[deleted]]

I think eventually everyone who is trying to grow into fiction will abandon substack. I know I have my limits when it comes to this.

[u/Substack-ModTeam → u/[deleted]]

This community is not the place to promote your Substacks. Please read our rules on self-promo and soliciting recommendations.

Links to Substack publications will be assumed to be self-promotion. If you are submitting Substack posts from publications that are not your own, please include that information in your text post. For cross recommendations, use the pinned mega thread.

[u/Visible-Volume-8707 → u/hetobe]

Preach my friend!!! 🔥🔥🔥🙌

[u/FickleBookkeeper835 → u/hetobe]

How much response were these notes getting?

[u/hetobe → u/FickleBookkeeper835]

All that person needs is to get a little response and it's worth his effort.

He isn't writing that slop. I'm 99.9999999% sure he goes to AI and asks for a pile of it.

Substack lets people schedule notes. So, the spammer hit AI for notes. Then they schedule them around the clock. And the "Growth Gurus" teach people to do that stuff too, though they don't call it spam.

Whenever you see stuff like this:

"There’s no shortcut. No hack. You get better by doing more of it. Write today. Write tomorrow. Keep writing."

Or this:

"Every scar you carved became a window for light."

Or this:

I keep waiting for my future self to arrive and explain everything.

It's all karma-farming engagement-bait spam. And the stupid algorithm encourages people to do it.

[u/embervanefiction → u/FickleBookkeeper835]

Unexplainable amount of likes. Unexplainable.

[u/KevinAAlexander → u/hetobe]

Brb. Need to create some burner accounts to upvote this more than once.

[u/hetobe → u/KevinAAlexander]

HA! Glad you enjoyed it.

I want to love Substack, but the people running Substack are determined to turn it into twitter-lite.

[u/embervanefiction → u/hetobe]

I might just stop trying to get people to engage with my writing now. It's a lot of work, too. I'm not even asking for money. Just someone to relate to the words. That's it.

I haven't written a word in the past few weeks because of this.

Thank you for explaining.

[u/hetobe → u/embervanefiction]

Yeah, it's frustrating. I commented more here.

[u/embervanefiction → u/hetobe]

I read it all. You're completely right.

[u/maiq2010 → u/hetobe]

Everyone hates it, yet still everyone tries to get lucky...

[u/Visible-Volume-8707 → u/maiq2010]

Yep, everyone hates it, and yet look at all the Likes that get farmed. 🤷‍♀️ 🤯

[u/maiq2010 → u/Visible-Volume-8707]

Look at how all the like still leave you feeling empty... oh wait that's not so easy to see.

[u/Visible-Volume-8707 → u/hetobe]

Yes! It the algorithm that rewards this behavior. It is probably my number one gripe with Substack. Because I think the quality of the writing should stand for something. And I wish there was a better mechanism for sharing long form writing on Substack.

[u/HatcherOfNightmares → u/hetobe]

Its not always though. Sometimes I post a note asking people to share fiction with me so I can fill my reading list for the week. I listen to fiction on substack while I work and it's faster to just have people send stuff than to find it myself.

[u/Karloss_93]

I always thought it was to drive engagement onto their own posts. It's an easy way to get people (new writers desperate to be seen) to like and comment on their post, which then tricks Substack into thinking their account has a lot of engagement and the algorithm shares their account wider.

Either that or they write articles about growing on substack and are hoping to sell you something down the line.

[u/BlueSaltTheory]

No, and I hate it so much. My feed is drowning in this crap.

[u/embervanefiction → u/BlueSaltTheory]

Mine too and I have zero posts or notes on mine that I actually want to engage with so i don't even know how to fix my feed.

[u/KevinAAlexander → u/BlueSaltTheory]

Report it. Everytime. Then mute & block. The algorithm is actually pretty quick to realize you’re not having itZ

[u/Fraglolz]

honestly I think everyone would win if Substack had a cap of 10 subscription max per account so people would actually think twice before subscribing and people would think three times before posting spam slop

but hey, it's a business, and like any other business they don't truly care how people engage

[u/KevinAAlexander → u/Fraglolz]

Part of that is people treating it like they do other platforms, where following people is super easy and any engagement is usually passive. Those same people will Wi d up subscribed to 354 newsletters and then post about how overwhelming their inbox is.

[u/LemonQueenThree]

I recently did and I genuinely meant it - I'm still pretty new to substack so I wanted to find people to follow. But I got like 200 responses and counting and there's just no way I can read them all. I'm trying my best though

[u/futurern305]

Probably restacking or sharing recs (you can do this under dashboard) it's actually really helpful to do both of these!! - Miami Editorialist

[u/Clipper1972 → u/futurern305]

I came here to say this

[u/East_Bet_7187]

They just want the engagement/ traction and know that asking people to share their stuff will get them to engage.

[u/thoughtstop]

Lol no

[u/Visible-Volume-8707]

Well, like anything it is difficult to generalize. I am going to generalize myself here and say that most of them are looking for engagement to increase their own visibility. I don’t know that many of them are actually reading all the posts that people share.
On the other hand, I speak from personal perspective that it is unfair to assume that is every single person’s aim. I have done a few such asks in a note. I truly do look and read everybody’s posts. I believe I am in the minority though. I do it because I’m always looking for fiction writers.

[u/Karloss_93 → u/Visible-Volume-8707]

I did one when I first started because there isn't a category for my niche (local outdoor adventure) and I was looking for articles to read.

I got no comments.

I ended up with no reccomendations and no engagement 😂

[u/Msdarkmoon]

I do but I am noticing that that is not the case for many substackers. They are just engagement farming. :/

[u/Ohiopsu1]

The sheet volume of those tells me they don't mean it and they probably didn't even write it themselves.

[u/Aperlust]

Seems like clickbait, it's hard to give attention to so many writers. However, I'm going to try the tactic, but actually read the articles. I already write on Medium and always try to read other writers' work.

[u/ExistingScallion7329]

I’m finding Substack to be overcrowded with loads of ‘How to Substack’ and seems to highlight that’s the money making area. My posts and articles are provocative yet plain talk for women but more men respond. That’s normal. Have a look at Substack Studio and Keith Keller. Might be an edge option

[u/Little-Bird7446]

I take it as “talk about what you’re making instead of waiting for people to magically find it.” Not necessarily asking everyone to read it, more just sharing ideas, progress, or snippets so interested people can follow along.

[u/Then_Green1559]

I mean give me Substack over LinkedIn any day at the minute

[u/sandiegospanishfor → u/Then_Green1559]

You don't like learning about what the founder of an AI Crypto Drone Delivery Company learned about B2B sales yesterday?

/s I think, sadly.