A Post In the Machine.

Substack "Live" video, using video at all, writing, not writing, it's all here, including the triumphant return of overthinking existentialism (and capitalism!).

It’s possible that you may have heard that Substack, which already features audio, video and numerous other fun things, has just launched a “live video” feature, as of Wednesday. This feature has initially been given to “best sellers” of which I am, kind of laughably, one of them (given that I also have to do like five other side projects just to live life). Anyway, as of Wednesday, it popped up as a feature on my Substack app.

I can tell you that my first reaction to reading the Substack explainer about “live video” was “Oh, god no,” from a personal perspective, and then “there goes the neighborhood” for the overall effect.

I was probably rash in both cases. I mean, it’s possible — but not likely — that I could use “live video” so that, what, you could watch me day drinking in Portland? A live video of Pepper barking at other dogs in the park and being a cranky old bastard?

There has been a video function for a while and I’ve used it sporadically — I could just record both of the above examples and post them. How does “live” benefit me? Or you?

It doesn’t.

I mean, I guess with this new feature I could have done a “live video” post from the Emmys, which was live on television, ostensibly the main ingredient of this blog, but since I don’t have to cover the Emmys for work anymore, then I no longer have to pretend that I care. So I didn’t watch.

But I am often rash about change, even though I have grown to accept change a lot in my life (sometimes seeking it out and embracing it, in fact); I just can’t seem to shake that initial reaction. Probably because I don’t want Substack to be Instagram, and I know a lot of people on this platform feel the same way. Others, however, are super ready to embrace live video. As my partner, a person who loves to cook, said yesterday — all the foodie Substacks are probably delighted, since you can do a “Come cook with me” live video.

Others, known better to themselves than to me, will be able to use this for some good as well. Godspeed to them. But for me, what are we all going to do — watch “Slow Horses” live together (I can only imagine the glitches).

Where I think this would work well is a kind of live interview/live podcast thing. Again, this can be done non-live, so it’s less thrilling. But were I so inclined, I could have called up another TV critic or just an opinionated friend and said, “Let’s do a live video interview right after the Emmys.”

I guess that would be a thing. If I had watched the Emmys. Or cared more about video.

I could definitely see circumventing our long planned wine/TV/culture podcast and instead just do a weekly “live video” chat with my friend and wine guru Dan Polsby, complete with wine drinking, discursive discourses on modern architecture, furniture and design, plus Dan, a filmmaker in addition to being a wine savant, discussing the history of Polish documentaries while I take Pepper for an emergency walk.

I mean, I can actually see that, people.

Elsewhere? What other uses are there for live video?

Chats are live by nature. Live responses on a screen. Yet, I don’t see the benefit of me using a live feed to have the camera focus on my typing skills (impressive) or my third-time-around platinum blonde locks (also impressive), as a selling point. I can only imagine the comments: “Looks like you’ve gained about 10 pounds in Portland this summer.”

Or: “Turn the camera toward Pepper!”

Yeah, pass.

Not a live video.

All of that said, I am going to continue to keep up the podcasts (even though there’s currently a glitch where it seems like Apple Podcast and thus Overcast and others are not picking up the new episodes? I’m working on it; they remain loading flawlessly into Spotify, if you get that). I also believe that video, which I’ve used before to deconstruct scenes, can be very useful. I just see no reason for it to be “live.”

Oddly, before the live video Substack announcement, I had wanted to use video to illustrate two scenes, one from “Slow Horses” (Episode. 2, but not a spoiler) and S2 Ep. 2 of FX’s “The Old Man,” also not a spoiler.

I’m going to use the scene from “Slow Horses” because as much as I have documented my love for the show, I have also said that it can sometimes fail to clear the bar and usually that revolves around a bad decision, like this one, where River, with no weapon, decided to stroll right into the mouth of trouble. In real life I was yelling at the screen. In making this non-live video, I am somewhat calmer:

So yes, I can see more usages of video in this manner.

You know me, I vibe on the lo-fi wabi-sabi nature of the framing, etc. Same as the non-shiny-perfect podcasts. So, sure, I can see more of that coming if I’m so moved.

(Honestly, whenever I launch the previously announced/referenced new Substack, which will be script related/fiction related, I have envisioned, for example, deconstructing scenes with the use of video to illustrate a point about good or bad writing, or how a minimal-dialog scene has as much punch, or more, than a lovingly crafted, verbally-heavy one).

But using it here more frequently is undecided.

Instead of showing you the video scene I referenced above from “The Old Man,” I will describe it, because describing things with words has worked for years. And also, the scene is simple: A character we know in the present, who is much older, appears as a younger man behind Jeff Bridges, and speaks to him as an apparition. This happens after a dream sequence. It is, to be clear, a lot of camera-flourish and a tired conceit.

And my point is this: No. Don’t.

Especially not after a dream sequence. It’s gilding.

Would that have worked as a video? Sure. But call me staid, I like to write, not record.

This new Substack feature and announcement is also strikingly timely, at least for me. I started this one you’re reading in January of 2022. I had been working on writing TV scripts and setting up stories that might one day become novels or movies and was otherwise living in the land of fiction, after most of my life had been spent in journalism, writing columns and stories and reviews that probably totaled a dozen or more novels. There is something glorious about daily journalism — cranking it out, often on deadline, having it seen, moving on to the next.

After a little more than two years of having written nothing anyone other than maybe a handful of people had seen, I was delighted to just write regularly again. To write and hit send. Flawed or not, it got made and seen. Yay.

Substack was (and is) the best platform for that, especially if one didn’t want to be doing it full time at a publication (not a lot of those anymore), and I definitely did not. I was (and am) splitting my attention between fiction writing, writing this Substack and doing a form of consulting for various TV channels/platforms.

But Substack has grown a ton — something I definitely saw coming. My partner KB and I talked about this before I launched. As the platform grows, we thought, it’s going to be much harder to gain traction. There will be innumerable choices. Without curation, that’s going to be overwhelming.

And I think it is overwhelming, so I’m not surprised that a kind of “pivot to video” moment would occur (that’s a nightmare joke for all writers; shout out to all my PTSD pals). Since writing fiction, or at least trying to, is my primary goal, did I really want to be playing with a bunch of bells and whistles trying to get noticed? Maybe? I don’t know.

I built the Bastard Machine brand online the new fashioned way and it was, frankly, exhausting. But that was my primary job so I never really thought about it as annoying, I thought about it as survival. And yep, eventually it paid off. I spent plenty of time at the top. I was having a great career. Then I got bored and left it.

I’ve found myself a lot less interested in “building the brand” here at Substack. I’m lucky that enough people who used to read me elsewhere found me here. I’m lucky that the Substack ecosystem — especially after Twitter went super toxic and I bailed — provided enough room to get randomly discovered by people who became subscribers and then eventually became paid subscribers.

As a side project, this is pretty rewarding and fun, at least personally if not financially. You readers have been great. But when something like “live video” comes along, it makes me wince a bit (not cringe, to be clear). Well before Wednesday’s announcement, this Substack really hit home for me (it’s a free read and someone I recommend):

What's your price for selling out?

In the post, writer John Warner covers a lot of ground. Not all of what he mentions is stuff I would need to think or worry about, but plenty of it is, and certainly the gist of it feels spot on to me. There are days (weeks?, months?) when I’m feeling guilty for not writing fiction — should I really be considering podcasts again, or doing some “creator” videos and shit, when I’m clearly avoiding this book or that old script? Probably not.

And yet — AND YET — I really do want to launch a separate podcast and Substack with my friend Dan on wine and TV and film and culture of all kinds. We’ve talked about it forever. Life keeps getting in the way. That could be a sign.

And yet (OK, you get it), I really am planning to do a separate Substack that centers around fiction and scripts and, well, just writing. Why? Because it intrigues me. It’s a thing that could work spectacularly well or also just fizzle. And believe me, this next post really and truly was a gut punch (also free, also someone I recommend):

My Baudelaire Summer

I own and have read two of Mason Currey’s books on the daily habits of creative people. They are great; filled with wonderful, enlightening, funny and relatable chestnuts. So as he’s been writing periodically on Substack about not getting his latest book turned in, then when he started this little detour he writes about in that post, I knew. I knew what it meant. And when he posted “My Baudelaire Summer,” I was proven right.

I was also hit by an anvil: Dude, this is exactly what you’re doing by thinking about another Substack or, god forbid, more podcasts! Maybe you should funnel some of that time into, you know, writing more fiction.

I’m not wrong. It’s a self realization I should heed. In the meantime, I’m still juggling things. It’s imperfect, but it’s the course, as of now.

Live video, probably not so much.