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If you want people to pay attention to your ideas these days, you really need to put things in video format. Ideally one that less than 30 seconds long and includes something funny or unexpected. It helps with the algorithm.

At the end of last year, The Economist published an article entitled Are adults forgetting how to read? which concluded “You do not need a first-rate mind to sense trouble ahead.” Stowe Boyd riffs on this and, like me, resists the temptation to ‘pivot’ to video with every fibre of his being.

The decline of literacy and the eclipse of reading, combined with algorithmic feeds breaking the ‘traditional’ follower model of the blogosphere and pre-TikTok social media, may be the death of newsletters, and ultimately, writing.

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In the near term, while the streams of video and AI slop seemingly are clogging every available orifice in the body public, I will continue living the writing life, even if it doesn’t lead to fame or fortune.

Source: workfutures.io

Image: Thomas Franke