First off I want to say I was not only surprised by but feel deeply grateful for all the support and insight that came my way over the last 24 hours.
I particularly want to thank those of you who commented, filled out the google survey (still open if you want to give your input!), reached out on Twitter, or subscribed paid. Alex, Stephen, Ajay, Deniz, Campbell Sproul, Litcoinbonged, Plebk, Seabagar, Matt, Mat, John, Kamran, Conclave, vtimdon and Drew: You retards not only provided me great feedback and a boost in motivation to keep on truckin’, but also much needed humor when I was feeling down (some of your google responses had me LOLing!). You are all absolute gigachads and I appreciate the ever living shit out of you.
To update you on the situation: I started two diary posts further playing around with this problem, however they won’t be published. If you’re really interested in the problem solving process itself, here is a shitty vlog I recorded in my car about it.
I would advise against watching it however because all its key takeaways are succinctly distilled below and the face reveal will destroy any idealistic image you have of me as an old wise Charles Darwin who is also hip and cool (don’t you wish Rollo Tomassi was still anon, anon?).
Regardless, here’s the learnings:
Key Learning:
I feel unsuccessful because I’ve yet to ever truly “build” something that is my own and which I’m proud of. All my “success” came from supporting other peoples creations (waging for another company, consulting for other companies/coaching startups, or investing in others assets). I need something that A. Is mine. B. I enjoy creating C. Am proud it exists D. Other people find worth “using” and E. Other people will pay for (or at least which can tie into something else that people will pay for). Minor Dissent does not currently check all these boxes. And, more importantly, it is not on a trajectory to do so. Thus, something about it needs to change.
Combining vulnerable personal shit with edgey philosophical shit with insightful self improvement tips just isn’t a good combo for a product. Very few want all three. And those who do, don’t really want them “together”. One is always limiting either your personal enjoyment of the content or your interest in boosting its signal (or both).
Marketing a blog that does all three of these doesn’t work for me. I can’t share my self improvement blog posts with normies because in the next post I might call someone gay or shit on some normie sacred cow. I can’t feel confident sharing my edgy philosophical posts with hardened internet autists because the next one might be a diary detailing all my insecurities (Or worse, I might do it right inside that one!). Basically, I am equally if not more disinterested in boosting Minor Dissents signal as you are, and that is a recipe for no growth.
I’ve way overestimated how much “trouble” it would be for people to just subscribe to multiple blogs. If you are a weirdo who likes all of these things, there is literally no downside to just subscribing to multiple; what email address the post came from doesn’t matter to you. And if anything it would benefit you because they’d be much more organized and contained.
There are several other good insights from the messages, comments, and surveys which I will ponder more later and maybe reach out to some of you guys individually on but I think that covers the big trends.
With these findings in mind, here’s what I’m thinking as far as how to move forward:
The Plan
1. Minor Dissent will revert to its founding intent.
Minor Dissent will continue however the MD mission of “building a new philosophy for human flourishing in a post-industrial world” will regain supremacy. It might change in wording to be more satirical and edgy but the core intent will stay.
MD will be controversial, combative, and naughty and focus on “macro” topics like philosophy, economics, sociology, or history. It won’t talk much if at all about me, my life, or how you can improve yours.
Think something like old Slate Star Codex meets old Moldbug; or Tim Urban if he was an edgy shit poaster who called everything retarded and gay.
It will include more meandering posts about high level topics such as “You Will Never Fix Society”, “Why Libertarianism Is Wrong”, “Post Modernism, Steelmanned”, “Why The Right Always Loses” and also focus on increasing the quantity and quality of structured effort post series’ like “Is Religion False But Good Anyway?”
2. the Actualization Hub substack will be reinstated.
The Actualization Hub substack will be reinstated, continuing where it left off, focusing on the “mezzo”. ie on helping you in your personal life to become more effective, set better goals, troubleshoot your problems, improve your relationships, make more money, live a more meaningful life, and all that jazz. Think James Clear meets Tim Ferris in content but Tim Urban in writing style (exploratory, long winded, fun).
Things like the MBTI series, “An Introduction To Dream Analysis”, or the “How To Get Clean” post that was supposed to follow Politics Is Worse Than will go here. Maybe I will eventually reintroduce “dense” stuff like Wisdom Wednesday (weekly five minute newsletter with a few self improvement micro-tips) or something similar.
I will also clean up and repost some of the old AH content from the website to it and intend to continue previously-abandoned series like Counterintuitive Ideas on Making Money or How To Get Addicted To Doing Things That Are Good For You.
It will also be “normie friendly”—avoiding controversial stuff, cussing, or calling everything gay and retarded. It will also talk a little bit about me, but only as much as is necessary to communicate the point to you so you can take more effective action (such as in the Dream Analysis post).
3. Diary posts will go on a new, third substack
I have created a new substack, Onlyfrens, which will focus on the “micro” ie the diary posts. It is like Onlyfans where I expose my insides for your perverted enjoyment, except instead of my butthole it is my deepest darkest most vulnerable thoughts.
If you want to stay up to date about me, get a “behind the scenes look” of what goes into the creation of the two blogs (or whatever else I’m working on), or just love the unfiltered rollercoaster of the folds in my retarded brain, then you will want to subscribe to that.
Other Considerations:
Some reservations or concerns I have with this new plan:
It’s not obvious where Burgundy Pill stuff will go.
Stuff like Feminism: The Female Beta Uprising would fit fine on Minor Dissent. But what about the plate spinning series? I think in an ideal world it would be it’s own fourth blog like Illimitable Man or Chateau Heartiste or Rational Male. But three blogs is already too much so we’ll just have to cope.
In practice, most of it will stay on MD because it is philosophical and controversial. However, the action steps really aren’t at all controversial (get a job, become useful, be strong, sort yourself out, etc) just good relationship and life advice even normies would appreciate. With a slight change in tone and style it would do just fine on AH.
If after I get MD or AH over the hump of growing themselves and find I still feel like The Burgundy Pill is a problem no one else is solving to my satisfaction then we can deal with it then (though I think TBP is the most likely to get solved one its own of the three).
What about posts that span two niches?
I’m thinking things like Politics Is Worse Than which starts as philosophical-how-the-world-works (Minor Dissent) then tangents to why depression exists and how to fix it (Actualization Hub) then goes back to philosophical-how-the-world-works. Or Dear Diary: I Am Gay where it starts out as a diary post then goes into some philosophical shit about Game Theory then returns to diary post.
What will ideally happen is that these will be broken up into separate posts and linked when relevant. eg rather than writing a thousand words on depression in the middle of Politics Is Worse Than, I would just link to a much better and more in depth AH post about it and say “as I detail here…” and then just continue on the philosophical rant. This feels much better to me and also massively improves readability.
Am I spreading myself too thin and causing all to fail?
My intuition says no. In fact, I think that this will make me far more productive and have energy to work twice as many hours.
As I described in this diary post: I waste so much time procrastinating writing because I can’t figure out what to remove and what to keep and how to keep these three different “niches” organized. I “should” write a diary post to figure it out but I avoid it because I feel like it ruins the brand. So then I just burn myself out avoiding it, which ultimately wastes a bunch of energy that could have gone to a “true” Minor Dissent or Actualization Hub piece that instead goes to sitting on Twitter and Youtube consuming bullshit all day. If I can outsource this separation to the system, I will be far more energy efficient.
This will also save a huge amount of energy by removing the incessant internal conflict I have between “tones” (mischevious-but-insightful shit poster vs professional-but-honest professor vs self loathing-but-authentic introspector) and “intended audiences” (naughty autistic eboys who wish to fix society vs professionals who wish to improve themselves and community vs HSP creatives who wish to find their trueselves) and some of you have even noticed and pointed out. Separating out these three personalities into different bodies will be better for everyone.
As far as my feelings of accomplishment are concerned, I’d like to be producing one to two posts per week. And I believe this new system will allow this while also resulting in me having more energy to spare than I do now (as, If I ever get “stuck”, I can always just work on one of the other blogs).
And even if my total output wouldn’t increase: my output is way too high right now for readers anyway. One fifteen minute post per blog per week is the ideal. Two is definitely the max. And if I only posted one post per blog per month I don’t think most would complain.
Will this limit my growth?
the key question is always “compared to what”? Will it limit my growth compared to if I could just focus on one? Yes, probably. But the reality is that I’ve spent almost four grueling years trying to heed the standard entrepreneurship rule of “don’t take on too many things at once” and it is now no longer debatable that I am just irreparably incapable of such directed focus.
Also, even that “yes” is questionable. If I could stay “on brand” with MD and just talk about edgey political stuff and not self improvement or my feelings or wahmen, it would probably be five times bigger than it is now. And AH was growing just fine while I was still an idiot who didn’t even know how to write well or market a blog. I didn’t stop working on it because it wasn’t growing I stopped working on it because Minor Dissent mattered way more to me.
MD will probably always take “priority” for growth, as when I die my contributions to philosophy are what I want to be most remembered for. And the point of this change is so that the rest of me will get out of the way. AH and OF can just do whatever they do organically, at least for the time being. And I will of course be crosslinking them when it makes sense.
What About Money?
It is true that this doesn’t solve the money problem. But like I said in the last post, I don’t live in the present. This whole “identity crisis” didn’t happen because I’m currently financially fucked. It happened because I’m on a trajectory to becoming financially fucked.
Building a product that actually satisfies a customer is the first step to a subset of them being willing to pay you. And this new model seems like it’ll be a huge QoL improvement for current and future readers (and me too). As long as I am on a trajectory to having a livable income in a few years then I can tolerate carrying the brunt of the start up costs for now.
If after a few months things still feel like they aren’t on a good financially trajectory, we can reevaluate then.
What will be my “root” personality?
This is mostly in regards to social media. Will I also separate out my tweets into their respective accounts? Revive the Actualization Hub Twitter or Instagram? Make a Mack Daddy twitter to correspond with Onlyfrens?
Probably not. MD will be the “root”. Maybe I’ll reactivate the AH social media eventually if I care enough to expand its reach. But for now let’s just experiment with the three substacks to see if this new love triangle even works for us.
Your Feedback Matters!
The more I think about this plan and put the pieces in their place, the more it seems like the solution I’ve been seeking for the last four years and was just too stubborn to implement. However around these parts, we never Trust The Plan™. This will probably need some tweaks and isn’t necessarily set in stone. I’ll need your help to improve it.
What do you think of this plan? What do you like about it? What are you concerns? Let me know in the comments below.
Thanks again for your insights, feedback, and attention. Please continue to engage and provide feedback, both positive and negative. I am retarded and can’t figure this shit out all by myself, so every word you contribute helps.
-Max
Substack needs a desktop app. The mobile app is amazing for reading quality content like what you just posted but the sort of insightful comment it deserves I find way easier with a keyboard. Yeah, I can just keep MD in my RSS feed (yes, I’m a dinosaur) but that’s a hassle.
Anyway, pretend this is an insightful comment praising you for your decision. It’s actually a placeholder for maybe typing that later.