Why We're Competing against Substack

This is a look at one of the specific points of friction on Substack that WeWrite seeks to overcome. There are many more, which will be written about.

Writers shouldn't have to feel Stage Fright. On Substack, your article must feel "finished" in order for you to send that dreadful "publish" button.

This stage-fright prevents the unleashing of ideas. Ideas are never finished. And yet, if you make changes to a published Substack article, you clutter up your recipient’s inbox with follow-up emails. Substack basically discourages making changes in this regard.

WeWrite is closer to MediaWiki (the software that powers Wikipedia) in that pages will constantly be worked on and improved over time. Depending on your permission settings, those improvements might be locked down to only be from the original author, or it might become a giant group project.

This blog, as well as our internal documentation, will eventually be moved to WeWrite itself. This is a “eat your own dog food” situation, where we can’t expect others to use something we ourselves aren’t delighted to use.

I feel a deep dread in hitting “send” because I hate how Substack works. Apologies to your email inbox. Soon a better writing platform will emerge. Soon WeWrite will be complete.

A writing app where you’ll feel safe to tend to your little knowledge garden — your knowledge lattice — without the stage fright of hitting “send.”