Open Tab: Joanna Coles has spent her formidable career at the center of media: Londonâs Fleet Street in the â80s, New York magazine, Marie Claire, Cosmopolitan, and eventually the chief content officer role overseeing Hearstâs entire global magazine portfolio. She knows intimately what legacy media organizations have looked like at every stage of their life cycle and spent years âmanaging declineâ from the inside. Two years ago, as Chief Creative and Content Officer, she helped take over and bring it to Substack, where it now operates a suite of newsletters and podcasts. She also writes , her own publication covering politics and power and where she co-hosts and sends out The Daily Beast Podcast to an audience of over 70,000 subscribers. Joanna invited us for a cup of tea and a slice of cake at , a West Village institution that has been importing British calm to Manhattan for over 30 years. There, she and Substackâs head of new media, , talked about the golden age of the glossy mag, the two questions Cosmo readers have never stopped asking, and what life looks like on the other side of the old media order. Hanne: For somebody growing up today in journalism school who might not know what old newsrooms were like, what was the culture? Joanna: Well, I mean, first of all, they were incredibly noisy because you had typewriters. And I am not exaggerating when I say that you would get seven pieces of paper, seven pieces of carbon paper. You would put it into the typewriter, and you would have to think very carefully about what you wanted to say, because if you made a mistake, you had to either rip the whole thing out and start all over again or you had to correct it seven times. And you would have what was called Tipp-Ex whiteout, where you had to cross it out. So there was more planning ahead of what you were going to write. It was fantastically noisy. Then computers came in, and half the newsroom, largely men, would say, âWell, Iâm not going to use a computer. Thatâs ridiculous. Thereâs nothin...
Substack
đ˘ Company Updates
. Substack added translation tools to help writers reach global audiences in different languages . New video recording studio lets creators make shows with guests and publish later . Platform added templates, better formatting, and tools to help writers look more professional
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Summary:
⢠Lena Dunham promoted her new memoir using Substack instead of traditional media
⢠She wrote different pieces for various Substack publications as a book tour
⢠Shows how authors can use newsletter platforms to reach audiences directly
Summary:
⢠Substack adds translation features to help readers access content in different languages
⢠Writers can now reach audiences worldwide regardless of language barriers
⢠Posts in English can be translated to 15 languages, and over 100 languages can be translated to English
⢠Aims to create a global exchange of ideas and knowledge
Summary:
⢠Substack added post templates so writers can reuse common elements like calls to action
⢠New drop caps feature gives publications a more polished, editorial look
⢠Enhanced live video tools let creators schedule streams and manage events better
⢠Updates aim to reduce repetitive work and give writers more control
Summary:
⢠Substack explains how to move newsletters from other platforms to their service
⢠Platform offers all-in-one tools for writers, podcasters, and media companies
⢠Claims their network helps creators get more subscribers and income through built-in discovery
Summary:
⢠Substack launches built-in video recording studio for content creators
⢠Users can now record shows with guests without going live, then publish later
⢠Automatically creates video clips and thumbnails to help with promotion
⢠Competes with other podcast and video creation platforms by offering all-in-one solution
Summary:
⢠Substack adds several new features including draft notes and multiple pinned posts
⢠Users can now save social media posts as drafts and export their analytics data
⢠Publishers get more control over their homepage appearance and text formatting
⢠Option to hide revenue numbers for creators who prefer privacy