This is the first full piece of video content released from last month’s NOVITĀTE conference, which I hosted on November 3, 2023, in Washington, DC
This conversation, titled “EVEN BETTER THAN THE REAL THING: The New Media Landscape”, featured author Walter Kirn, Substack Co-Founder Hamish McKenzie, and Renée DiResta of the Stanford Internet Observatory. It was moderated by New York Times columnist Ross Douthat.
This was a conversation that needed to happen. A key issue of contention was whether or not media companies can “manage” mimesis effectively—and whether they should be in the business of trying to do so at all.
The release of this video is particularly timely in light of calls for Substack to moderate its content the way that other social media companies have tried, and failed, to do effectively. Today I signed this letter written by author Elle Griffin, along with dozens of other writers on this platform including Bari Weiss, The Abbey of Misrule, Freddie deBoer, Ted Gioia, and…
