Hi friends!
Why are you receiving this email (or seeing this post)? Well, a bit of background…
I recently lamented that blogs have, by and large, been taken over by social media. What I mean is that thoughtful authors are now posting most of their material on Facebook instead of their own spaces. Maybe you’re wondering – ‘why don’t people just post a link to their actual blog on Facebook?’ Many have tried, but it doesn’t actually work because algorithms aren’t really designed that way and therefore only a few people see their work. Harmless? Not exactly.
In my view, relying solely on social media is problematic for a few reasons. First, you become hooked on the medium. I recently saw Seth Haines, an author I respect, post that he was going to take a six month hiatus from social media. And we all applauded. But then we questioned: How are you going to let us know about your work? Isn’t this killing your ‘platform’ as a writer. On and on the questions went. That’s when it hit me just how quickly we get owned by social media. Seth Haines writes about addiction and how we can wake up from addictions, big and small, in order to truly encounter God. How deep the irony, then, that people wondered how this author – the one who writes on addiction – could be successful if he broke free from social media for a while. This didn’t sit well with me and I began to wonder how we might do things differently?
A second problem I see with social media is also related to algorithms. It is my understanding that currently (or at least recently), the posts that gather the most attention (the ones you see show up in your feed) are the ones that have the most angry face reactions. In a time when we want, and desperately need a break from all of the anger, the posts with angry reactions are (intentionally!) the ones that show up in our feed. I try and be thoughtful with my posts. I don’t always succeed, of course, but I try. But I’ve noticed something troubling. I can write a truly thoughtful post on Facebook which gathers some interest and healthy pushback, but inevitably someone will post something outlandish in the comment section and suddenly I have 200 comments where people are bitterly arguing with each other. Most times they’re not even arguing about the post itself, just something that got brought up in the comments. Of course, the more they argue, the more other people see the post, and the more the actual thoughts in the post get lost amidst the vitriol.
All of that to say, I’m wanting another means of communicating which allows me a little more freedom to break away from the above. I will continue to post on my blog (philaud.com), but I am also going to try Substack out as an attempt to remedy some of my concerns (thanks to those who suggested it). You will receive an email when I have a new post (which will generally also be posted on my website) and can comment, like, or share within Substack, if you’d like. If you’ve received this email it’s because you’ve been interested in something I’ve done in the past. Feel free to unsubscribe if this isn’t for you. No offense taken.
What will I post about? God, Faith, and Faithful Imagination in the 21st Century. You may recognize that tag line from my podcast (theomagination). It’s what I’m interested in and what I hope to thoughtfully engage.
In the coming weeks I want to write a series of posts on mission & evangelism. They will be as follows:
-Lesslie Newbigin, Andrew Root, and the Depressed Church
-Who Sets the Moral Implications of Conversion?
-Engaging in Mission For Your Own Conversion
Will I still post occasionally on social media? Probably from time to time. But I’m hoping this may be a more helpful and healthy medium for communication. I hope you might find some of it helpful (and healthy) too.
Grace + Peace,
Phil
Good thoughts!