Medium CEO Tony Stubblebine: Here's How Writing Evolves In The AI Era

Channel: Alex Kantrowitz

Published at: 2025-10-30

YouTube video id: sf0SHZ7zujs

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sf0SHZ7zujs

What is the future of writing in the age
of AI? And what does Medium want to be?
We'll cover that right after this.
Welcome to Big Technology Podcast, a
show for coolheaded and nuanced
conversation of the tech world and
beyond. Today we have a great
conversation for you because we are
being joined in studio by the CEO of
Medium, Tony Stubble. Tony, it's great
to see you. Welcome to the show.
>> Thank you for having me in person. This
is great.
>> It's great to have you here. We're going
to cover a lot of ground today. I think
one of the things that's fascinating
about Medium is you're sort of ground
zero for a lot of the questions we ask
about AI. Do we want AI writing? How
should AI be crawled by generative AI
agents, AI engines? Uh all the above.
We're going to get into all of it. Uh
let's start right away with AI slop u
because why start slow? There was a
story in medium talking about how AI
slop is flooding me is flooding medium.
Sorry, a story in Wired talking about
how AI slap is flooding flooding medium.
You took issue with the story. Let me
just at least put the premise of it out
there and give you a chance to respond.
Um Wired spoke with this company called
Pang Gra Labs.
>> Uh it looked at more than 270,000
stories. It found that something like
47,000 47% uh were AI generated. Is AI
slap a growing problem on the internet?
How is
>> how is Medium dealing with it? Is this a
fair uh uh study that they did on your
content?
>> Oh, these are multiple questions. Um uh
yes, uh slop is a important thing going
on right now.
>> Should we define it?
>> Yeah.
>> What's your definition of AI?
>> So like
>> because AI generated stories aren't
necessarily slop or are they
>> right? It's there's a spectrum of it. So
let's start with like every platform is
mostly uh deleting and hiding the things
that get posted to it. So like this
whole idea that censorship bad is bad is
sort of like because if you run
a platform the majority of what people
try to post on your platform is spam and
this is like no one would debate whether
or not we're doing the right thing by
getting rid of it because it's like
Viagra ads or or just like really like
like outright financial scams or like
content that's literally made illegal by
for good reason CSAM and whatnot. So
like we're already in the business of
trying to prevent certain types of
content from making it out into the
algorithm. And what happened in the age
of AI generated content is that there's
this like slightly more human form of
content or that or at least it looked
more human, but it's really nothing.
It's just a new form of spam. And so we
treat it the way we like treat all spam.
It's like if we can like if we can catch
it and block it outright, we catch it
and block it outright. If we can't be a
100% sure that uh the user should be um
blocked or um removed from the platform,
we'll allow it onto the platform, but
really try hard not to let it um make
its way either into the Google search
index or into our own recommendations.
So this article from Wired, I think my
favorite thing about it, for what it's
worth, is the way that they created a
meme. Like just this phrase AI slop. I
had not seen it anywhere until that one
article and then they wrote some
follow-up articles. Yeah,
>> it was already a pretty common term.
It's actually surprising to me that you
hadn't
>> really you were already using that. I
just it it just felt like that term
became the deacto term in that moment
and I just like Yeah, I like to see like
kind of the curve of of a meme take off
and it it's a good term. It's the right
we should all be using it. What I took
issue with honestly was um that uh it
was asking the wrong question. Does it
matter how much slop is on Medium or
does it matter uh which is the question
they were asking and does it matter how
much slop our readers are seeing which
is the question I'm asking right so we
do all of this work to prevent readers
from seeing the slop and I think we're
doing a really good job I think you know
like for the most part when I get
complaints about AI content on Medium
it's it's what's showing up in the
comments it's not what's showing up in
the posts because our recommendation
system is quite
Um, so I think that was the first thing
I took issue with and then there's
something just suspect about the service
provider that they used where it's like
they that at the same time this article
is coming out that service provider is
using the article to try to get me to
hire them and there just it felt like a
conflict of interest. Oh, so they so by
the way AI slap just to define it just
lowquality written content sometimes
images and videos but
>> in your case I think written that's just
being posted on the internet for for
engagement hacking.
>> Yeah. Right. I mean you could just think
of it as like a prompt like you know
it's like oh
>> uh explain AI you know and you go to
chat 2PT and say write 5,000 words about
AI for me and then you just cut and
paste that into Medium. But I think a
lot of it is also it is following the
incentives of the internet already
because there there if we're being
honest there's a ton of content out
there on the internet that is being sort
of generated in really lowquality ways
whether it's outsourced writing or
whatever it might be that's sort of
responding to these incentives to like
get stuff in front of search engines.
>> And how how different does this feel to
you than pre-AII slop? I mean those
incentives already existed.
>> Not different. But the question I have
for you is the scale because you're
seeing this on the provider end. Yeah.
>> Are you seeing a a real increase in this
type of content showing up on Medium
because of the scale?
>> We saw like a 10x increase in what
people were trying to post on Medium.
>> But also at some level it was kind of a
non-issue because the tools we use to
battle it are the same tools we were
already using to um to battle spam and
to filter out the filter the good stuff
into the network and leave the bad stuff
out. So, we got a huge increase uh in
volume, but not in what the readers see.
And I still I'm like somewhat perplexed
that that article made it to print
because it was really a nothing burger
for us. It just it was a little bit of
extra work, but the same type of work we
were already doing.
>> It's funny you say uh we got an
increase. Uh it is that increase still
being sustained that 10x increase?
>> Yeah, it didn't it didn't turn out to be
exponential. So it just it came and uh I
think we tightened up uh
>> um and maybe became less interesting but
you know it's like the it was just a
step function and the change in price
and that that um there's not a as
significant of a change in price to
create that slop anymore and you know
gets incrementally cheaper but it's
still like it was somewhat cheap and
then it became very cheap and that's
just like night and And that night and
day, I think just created a one-time
change in the amount of trash that was
getting thrown at platforms. And I think
that's true for all platforms.
>> You said something very interesting that
the provider, the the tech company that
went to wired with this data, then came
to you and
>> tried to sell you their AI detection
services. I hadn't known that.
>> I mean, the reporter knew
>> really.
>> I
>> this was happening while the story was
underway.
>> Mhm.
Did they write Did they include that in
the story?
>> Uh I can't quite remember. Okay.
>> Um I it was like I don't know. This is
sort of a
uh a little bit to me the story is a
little bit sus just because of that. Um
but uh the reporter did you know at
least give our you know our case that
what gets read matters more than what
exists.
>> Yeah. in the deck. It was uh it was Tony
Stubble says
it shouldn't matter at all. But but but
let me let me give inh counterpoint here
about why it should matter. Uh you
already brought up search engine
indexing and you're trying to make sure
that this stuff is not indexed via
search engine. One thing uh that Medium
as as someone who writes on Medium, I
also write on Substack. We're going to
get into the difference between Medium
and Substack in a bit, but as someone
who writes on Medium, one thing I see is
Medium ranks really high in search.
>> Uh I wrote this story, this profile on
Daario Ammoday. You cannot find it uh on
Substack it, but my the I posted the
same post on Medium
>> and it ranks way up there when you're
searching for Daario. And I imagine that
if I was someone who was in the business
of putting up AI slop trying to get
traffic uh and revenue from search
engines uh even if Medium is not
recommending that to readers, it's
actually a great venue to try to get in
front of people because of the search
ranking.
>> I for I mean I feel like I'd rather just
lean into for your for your listeners.
Yeah. like SEO on Medium is great and
that's a reason to write on Medium for
as far as fighting the AI sub it the the
thing that we do for them is the same as
we do for spam is we we literally remove
them from the Google index like we we
spend a fair amount of time actually
making sure that um uh that the quality
of what we index on Google is is high
and Um, I think what we've heard from
Google actually is sometimes they're
confused by what we're saying no index
to. And I've gotten emails that are that
are that have brought up stories that
that literally ask why these 10 stories
aren't indexed. And we look at them and
we think, "Yeah, cuz we don't think
they're real enough. We don't think
they're authentic enough. We don't think
they're deep enough." Yeah.
>> It's fascinating because it gets right
into this conversation about um whether
all AI generated content is uh slop.
>> Yeah. And um I even let off this
conversation asking what's the future of
writing or blogging
>> in the age of AI and it seems like AI is
getting better at writing and is there
going to be a point where
people in the position that you are in
say you know what it's better than most
humans at writing let's just let it rip.
I I am always confused by um uh when
people worry about the future of
writing. So let me just start with first
principles, right? Like writing is
thinking and smart people like to think
that's not going away. When you have a
thought and you put it onto paper or put
it, you know, type it out, suddenly this
like all these subconscious like
feelings about that thought, all of your
like life lessons get articulated in a
way where just as the writer you
understand it better. And so the role of
AI in there is not to replace you. Like
if you're someone that thinks there's
value to your life and being smart, like
you're not going to stop writing. And
it's the same with reading. We've been
down this path with is it valuable to
get a summary rather than read the whole
thing. Right? This is like the
cliffnotes story, right? The cliffnotes
did not replace the book because there's
something about the way our brains work
that learn through story and a lot of
what we're learning is the human
components of that story. It's not just
a set of facts. It's uh the humans
involved in that story. What did they um
you know, what did they learn? what did
they think of it? Uh like if they're
giving advice, why you know that all of
that stuff ends up mattering and it's
why it's why self-help books are as long
as they are. You know, the advice is
usually a page, but then half the book
is social proof and that's for a reason
is to help you understand why you might
make the effort to take that advice. Um,
and so I just I never have any doubts
about trends about writing because I
just I don't think that that there's
ever going to stop being a market of
people who think their life gets better
if they get smarter. Like that's not
going away, right? And so, um, where
people are getting confused is it just
turns out there's a lot of writing
that's only done for reasons,
right? It's like I'm required to to give
a report or I have to pass some writing
up to some bureaucracy, right? And so
you're just checking the box on having
provided any writing at all. And yeah,
AI can do that, but that was never about
thinking or being smarter in the first
place.
>> Yeah, I think we'll both agree that
there is real virtue in writing. I mean,
I do it as a living. You've done it as
living for a long time. Um that idea of
going from something that you think you
know and then you start writing it and
you realize you don't really know it at
all.
>> Yeah,
>> there's great value in trying to get
connect those ideas on the page. That's
obviously, you know, we're big
technology podcast. That's why Amazon
does their uh six pages is to try to
although maybe those are going to be AI
generated and that's a real question.
Um, and they they do it so they can, you
know, instead of having a PowerPoint
where your ideas are disconnected, you
you write it down so you actually know
what you're talking about. And I think
that's been a big driver of success
within that company for a long time.
Similarly, you when I'm trying to get
into the bottom of concepts um or or
think I know certain things and I'm
writing it down, I'm like, "Oh god, I
got to make another phone call because I
have no idea what happened in the middle
of that story um that I'm reporting." So
>> that I love that like that anecdote is
so powerful, right? It's that you think
you understood what you were talking
about until you had to force yourself to
put it into words and then you realize
there's huge gaps, right? That's like
that is the proof of how important
writing is to thinking.
>> Yeah. No, I so so I think we're we're
both in agreement here that that writing
>> writing is good. Let's preserve it.
>> Yeah. The other side of it though is
that is that I think that we I think
actually I don't even think I know that
both of us believed that AI wasn't going
to be or was not very useful uh in
writing and and now we both believe that
it is becoming more useful. This is
something that you wrote uh in August.
Uh is is there a way to use AI uh to
deepen understanding or help writers
tell their human stories? Two years ago,
we thought the value to writers and
readers was less than zero. The AI
companies had leeched value from your
writing without offering consent,
credit, or compensation. They enabled a
wave of spam that tried to replace your
writing with hallucinated slop. Um, as
we've continued working on making Medium
the best place to read and write, we've
noticed and heard something. We we've
noticed and heard from our readers and
writers that some use of AI is starting
to be useful. So, it is starting to be
process. I thought I was going to regret
having written that when you started
reading it, but now now I now having
heard it back, I love it. Like I pulled
no punches on that. Um I think I think
what I was saying there is just like a
blunt commentary of the state of AI at
any given moment. And not that AI could
ne like two years ago it wasn't I
thought AI could never be valuable. I
thought in that moment it was literally
just creating problems. Um, and um, and
I mean that was true. Like it it was not
good enough to really help the writers.
It and it was uh providing more spam and
more slop. And I mean it wasn't uh a ton
of work to fight it back, but it was
some and it was creating a real sense of
unfairness in the community. I mean our
community thinks that their content got
stolen and not for a legal reason but
for like a for a reason of society right
like so like societies run on exchange
of value and for these AI companies to
train on the content and offer nothing
in return just breaks that like uh that
sense of fairness that well if you got
something I should get something too.
>> And they crawled and trained on medium
content. Oh yeah, for sure. The um this
is uh so here's a a lesson uh that I'm
bringing up uh more often because I
think if they don't get their act
together, we're going to do it again.
It's we learned really early on that
medium is a big enough big enough corpus
of data that we can poison the uh um the
results of any large language model. And
the way we learned this is because my
found my boss and the founder of Medium,
Evan Williams, when he started Medium,
he was a huge fan of M dashes. And so
he's the one that that built it early on
into Medium that if you do a double dash
or, you know, dash in certain points, it
gets automatically converted to M
dashes. And so as a result, M dashes
became just like automatically added
into medium content for a decade. And
then also just culturally part of medium
like writers who'd never heard of M
dashes are suddenly seeing M dashes. And
so the medium training the training set
of just the medium corpus is so heavy on
M dashes because that's what Evan
Williams like thought he just thought
they were beautiful among many
typographical um opinions of his.
>> Wait, this is why Chachi PT writes on M
dashes.
>> I'm saying it's because of medium.
Absolutely. is because um we
>> in part we popularized it in other parts
of the internet too but the medium
corpus is very very deep in those and so
great so when you hear oh this must have
been written by AI because it's got so
many m dashes it's because the AI is
trained on medium which does have a lot
of m dashes naturally so like uh um I
think that if we if we can't find some
fair exchange of value if we can't get
uh something going if they insist on
continuing to train and work around our
our blocks and, you know, continuing to
avoid um even paying for what they're
training on. Um I think we're just like
a lot of other platforms are going to
quietly uh catch their crawlers and and
poison uh the content that they're
training on. And who knows, you know,
what uh weird hallucinations we can uh
fit into their um uh their training set.
>> So you would play dirty like that? I
mean, this is a prisoner's dilemma,
right? You start collaborative. If
you're matched with collaborative, you
stay collaborative. If you're not
matched, then you you have to switch
too, right? Like, you know, effectively
they they're antisocial is the what I
would say. Like all all of these
companies, OpenAI, Google, an Anthropic,
like they could have started with, hey,
we want to do this thing. We think we're
going to get a lot of value out of it.
we want to train on your content. How
can we help you get value out of it?
like that could have been the starting
point and instead like their choice
completely their choice they took the
starting point of we're going to train
on your content what are you going to do
about it and sort of it's taken the
industry a while to react but we are
reacting right now and I I wish we had
reacted as an industry earlier um but
now that we do I think we're going to
have to you know have to see which of
these companies want to come to the
table and which are going to continue to
be antisocial and if they are They're
going to be met with antisocial
behavior, of course.
>> Yeah. Okay. So, we have we have uh some
news about the steps you're taking here
to fight back. We're going to get to
that in a minute, but I just want to
keep following the thread that we
started on, which is uh this idea that
this was not very useful for writing. AI
tools were not very useful for writing a
little bit ago. Now, they're becoming
useful. So, where have you found the
useful areas?
>> Oh, yeah. Um, I think the thing we're
most excited about is the idea of an AI
agent acting as your assistant as you're
writing. So, as we're building, we're
building writing tools right now. We're
about to actually announce that we've
broken ground on a new writing app for
Medium. Um,
>> say more about that.
>> I mean, come to Medium day on Friday.
When When does this go live?
>> This is going to go live after that. So,
you can talk more about it.
>> Yeah. So, um, we're, uh, the, um, is a
companion to medium for all of your
writing, for your notes, for your
drafts, for things you're planning to
publish, for things that you're sharing,
and containing um, uh, like all all of
the things that feed into that writing.
Um, you know, saved articles,
um, your reading history sometimes. Um
and we found a couple things is one AI
applied to your own writing is um such a
helpful way to search and organize it,
right? Because you and now instead of
like a keyword search, you have this
free form uh kind of um way to uh say
like, oh, you know, I've got all these
deadlines coming up. Can you summarize
all my notes about, you know, this
upcoming project and list out the
deadlines and date order? Like, you can
just tell an AI that now, right? Um, but
we've only been able to look at it
through the lens of the entire internet,
right? That's what chat GPT will do that
for everything that's on the internet.
We haven't really seen a lot of that
applied to everything that you've ever
written. Um, and the there's a a lesson
I had learned in the past. studies come
kind of from the world of productivity.
I spent a big chunk of time there, which
is productivity nerds are always making
um complicated systems that are fragile
and break down and the ideal system
allows you to be messy and I think
that's what AI lets you do there. And
then there's this other piece of AI as
the writing assistant. And the our view
there is is that actually you can kind
of put the AI to the side and what it'll
allow allow you to do is stay in your
train of thought. Right? So this is not
AI replacing you. This is actually AI
letting you be more human. like get your
thoughts onto paper and then um and then
when you're coming back around for the
edit pass, AI has like a lot of really
smart suggestions uh alongside of it. So
that's that's what we've figured out as
we start to like actually fold uh the
current state of AI um into helping
helping people write more.
>> Okay, so let's talk about a couple of
these things. So first of all, AI
allowing you to be messy. Am I reading
it right? that uh for these old
productivity tools you'd have to like
really like use their systems and yeah
>> I'm thinking about Rome you with Rome I
tried to use that it broke my brain it
was so complicated to use it was like
you have to make uh headings and
subheads and subheads of subheads and
subheads of
>> different children and parent things and
some people who
>> I don't know whatever their brain works
that way could use it
>> I couldn't use it and so what you're
saying is what AI will allow you to do
on the productivity end is maybe just
dump all your notes and writing and
emails into one thing and then you can
just query it and it will be able to
handle that unstructured data. Well,
>> yeah, there was a word we were using
which is not the app name uh but we've
been using the word bucket for a while
which is just the idea of what does it
take for you to feel safe
>> to think like
>> this is a bucket that I can throw
anything into it and I don't have to
spend time organizing it and I know I'll
be able to get it out when I need to.
Like what's required to design an app to
do that? And I think it's possible now,
>> right? And before it was just like you
would have to like
>> Yeah.
>> Goodness gracious, the amount of work
that went into build it's called
building a second brain.
>> Yeah.
>> It's like you your your entire first
brain is being used to build this
>> second brain. I'm sure it worked well
for some people. Not for me.
>> It did. It did. And if you're extremely
motivated Yeah. I I would say I think
the second brain concept is mainstream,
but the current implementation is not
because it's too hard. Right.
>> Yeah. Sorry to all the productivity
folks that I've offended with that, but
having a a better tool and I think
you're right, generative AI could enable
that type of thing being built. I'm
looking forward to using yours. And then
the writing side of things, this will
enable the writer to basically have an
AI editor. It's funny cuz I use that now
with Chat GPT. Um I'll like drop my
drafts in, my interviews in, and I'll
ask like uh what did I miss? Did I
capture the tone of the interview
faithfully? And so you're going to build
something purpose-built for that.
>> Yes. And some of the things you've seen
um already are good and we'll include
those. But we have some unique takes on
it that I think um reflect that we are
actual writers and we've written a lot
over the years and we have um kind of a
deep understanding of the all the
writing processes from idea to
publication. Yeah.
>> Okay. So how how AI changes the future
of writing. We've talked a little bit
about the production of writing and why
that is important there. The other side
of it is since we're here with the CEO
of Medium is the the other side of it is
um how how a a public publication or a
platform handles this writing. Now
you've talked a little bit about how um
you don't want lowquality AI content uh
on Medium and we'll treat it as as spam.
Um, but also in that post where you
talked about how AI is becoming more
useful, you you clearly say we're going
to limit the the distribution of AI
generated content and you'll say no to
AI generated content in your partner
program. But then you had something um
something interesting uh that you said
after that headline about not including
AI generated content in your partner
program which I think pays some humans
>> to write uh on medium. You wrote, "Even
if Chat GPT could generate a perfectly
valuable story, we still want our
partner program to incentivize human
storytellers." And that even if is
interesting because you you really went
from a place where you thought that
there was no use here to now even
acknowledging the fact that Chad GPT
could write
>> a valuable story. So, and we we we both
see this stuff improving and and uh
making more useful content. So, what
does a world look like where Chad GPT
could write, you know, as well? Again,
I'll go back to it. Forget like we both
agree there's a virtue to writing, but
forget the production side of it. Now, I
want to talk about the the publication
side of it to you.
>> I wonder if you have like a go-to
good research example. The one I've been
using is I I spend most of my time a
little bit north of New York City and I
have a go-to research prompt, which is
uh go find
events in my area in the next two weeks.
And then I go on to say specifically
look for these sporting events. I'm in
the boonies, so my sporting events are
minor league baseball, minor league
soccer, and roller derby. But that's
what like I just want to know, are they
in town? Um, are there uh what's going
on at the county fairs? What's going on
at like art openings? Like what's going
on at the movies? Like just like find
all of that and give it to me. And so
this is a customized uh event calendar
for me essentially that is probably
relevant to anyone,
>> thousands of people,
>> thousands of people. So why wouldn't I
publish that, right? There's I think
that would be for me an example of
valuable AI generated writing. The human
element is my own taste in the prompt.
Uh and then the result is like fairly
factual. And I think let's be um
completely like honest. it would be um
tough uh it would be rude to publish
that without at least double-checking
that it was factually true because I've
many times thought I was getting good
research out of one of these AI tools
and then only to find that yeah it had
hallucinated the whole thing but let's
say it's my the human effort is in the
prompt and then in the facteing and
otherwise that's AI written top to
bottom yeah I think that should be
published and I think I you know someone
publishing it would be doing a service.
Um,
what what we're saying in this really
kind of niche part of Medium, which is,
you know, 80% of what gets published on
Medium is by people that are just using
the tool and the Medium network for
distribution. They're not uh, you know,
the vast majority of the internet is
non-professional writers, like just
people who are looking for a way to
communicate with the world, right? And
that's what I that's like the part of
medium, the part of blogging that got me
excited in the first place. And what a
lot of what they're communicating is
just a life lesson. This thing happened
to me and I want to share share it with
you. And those life lessons are not in
the uh AI training sets yet, right? And
those life lessons, if they're not
published, won't show up in the AI uh
research because that is just scouring
the internet. So where are we going? How
are we going to get people to continue
sharing the lessons of their life?
Right? There has to be some incentive
systems and um uh to date it has been
Google, right? Like the idea that you
can uh just write something on the
internet and traffic will just show up
out of the blue. That's kind of like ma
like Google made the public internet.
And so a question that I wonder is you
know is Google taking that away? If they
take the incentives away is the public
internet going to go away and the small
part that we play is that uh there's a
section of medium that where we pay the
writers and we pay them uh essentially
to make our subscription business work
to get some of the best writing not all
of it but some of it behind the
subscription and that's that's how we've
made a business and so that's what we
you're saying is our partner program. So
for them, we were just like taking a
stand and saying like the thing that we
want to pay for to make sure it exists
on the internet is your real life
lessons. And this idea of paying you to
spend 15 seconds generating a chat GPT
uh transcript
just not even doesn't even make sense to
us as a worthy thing to pay for. But
that's different than saying whether or
not uh it's valuable. It's like we're
saying we're paying to make something
exist on the internet that otherwise
wouldn't exist.
>> I see. So what does the web look like if
we're going to have a lot of writing
that's generated by AI given like
thinking about your event calendar um
sitting alongside
>> and probably outnumbering human content,
human generated content.
>> Yeah. Yeah.
>> If it doesn't already. Probably does
already. But the quality question, it
will keep getting better though.
>> It it could um do we are we going to
My head originally went straight to
relationships, right? Are we going to
get tired of having relationships with
each other? Are we going to prefer an AI
for a relationship, too? And of course,
that's like the weird edge of AI right
now, too. um you have AI girlfriend, AI
boyfriend, and cuz it's like the degree
to which that shifts is that's one of
the other reasons that people write and
share online is because we're trying to
create connections with each other,
right? I I mean, I don't think that will
ever disappear. I hope it never
disappears. I still like connecting with
people. Um so I think that'll continue
to drive a lot of uh activity. But the
question I've been posing to friends and
advisers is if if Google Gemini
reduces search traffic enough that there
that there isn't an incentive to post in
public. Will people retreat in private?
And the example I I usually give cuz we
already see this happening which is we
think Twitter there was a Twitter exodus
and it went to like most people think
the Twitter exodus went to blue sky and
to threads and originally a little bit
to mastadon.
I would make the case that a lot of it
went to Discord
and that's an example of the public
internet retreating into private spaces
where it's safer to be yourself and to
be weird and to be um uh um yeah into
>> it's also less noisy.
>> Well, I've never seen a a Discord that
didn't make my head explode. But
>> well, you should I mean you should join.
We have one for big technology
subscribers. I think it's excellent. I
mean, seriously, like, but but I I was
going to say that I've seen exactly the
same thing that you've seen is that a
lot of my I could go like weeks now
without tweeting or a week, let you be
realistic. Um, but I'm I'm in the
Discord all the time and it's just it is
less noisy. It's it's friendlier. Not
all of them are, but it is friendlier
than Twitter, which it's easy to be
friendlier than Twitter. Uh, and it's
it's more
>> information dense and less madness
inducing because you don't have that
home tab driving you nuts.
>> That right. What? All right, you've
convinced me. Smart people join the big
technology discord.
>> You heard it here first.
>> Um, yeah, that I think um I'm not
worried about like the end of
civilization or something. I just think
I just think the internet is shifting a
lot right now, right? And that's
probably one of the shifts that will
happen is if you don't if the incentives
for public uh discussion uh disappear,
you guys see people shift into into
different ways to get kind of the same
the same thing that they had been
getting.
>> Yeah. On the AI relationship thing, it's
interesting. I And it's curious. It's
I'm curious about the way that you put
it because it's not necessarily a
preference like that people prefer AI
girlfriends over human girlfriends and
boyfriends. It's more just like it's a
sub it's a substitute when those
relationships are not there.
>> Sure. Right. Right. Um
>> I wonder if something can be said for
content as well.
>> Yeah. It could be a yes and right. Um
yeah, I think there's a lot of
placeholder content. um fill, you know,
fill your time and uh um and
uh but it's not the pinnacle of of um a
deep substantial experience. I think
that's true in human relationships and
it's I think true in certain writing.
>> Yeah. Well, for now, see how things
change. Okay. I do want to talk a little
bit about the uh approach that you're
taking at Medium to sort of we've had
Matthew Prince on is in the same chair
talking about how Cloudflare is trying
to um force AI companies to pay
>> uh if they want to crawl publish your
content. You recently started a similar
program along with a number of others.
So talk a little bit about your your way
to protect the content from human
content creators.
>> Uh Matthew is like my hero. I really uh
I see it very similarly to how he sees
it. And so I think to go back to this
like we're in antisocial relationships
uh between with the AI companies right
now, right? Like it's not it didn't
start collaborative, it started
antagonistic, right?
So what I read in his announcement with
Cloudflare, which it was that we need to
make it easy at Cloudflare for a lot of
our customers
to block all the AI crawlers. And if we
do that for enough content sites, then
they're going to have to negotiate. And
it really sounded like what he was
saying was leverage first. Like
everything else can be figured out
later, but first you need enough
leverage to bring them to the table. So
like that makes perfect sense to me.
What um is not ideal to me is that is
that doing that would rely on um uh a
single service provider that we could
only bring them to the table if we're
Cloudflare customers. Now, Medium is a
Cloudflare customer and a happy one, and
we do use Cloudflare to block uh um
basically any crawler that isn't
crawling in a way that drives traffic
back to us, we're blocking right now.
And it's because the Cloudflare tools
are so good, but I always would have
preferred an open license. And so, there
is one that just launched, real simple
licensing standard, RSL. And um uh and
it what it's getting is a coalition of
platforms and media properties. Kora and
Reddit are part of it. Yahoo is part of
it to say here's an internet standard
that um we're going to put out that uh
lays out how we want AI companies to use
or not use our content. And um you know,
of course, the default thing we're going
to say is no, we don't like we don't
want you to do anything until you talk
to us. But at least now we can say that
in an an official way. And um and for
people that are not um for AI companies
that are not not respecting it, then we
use tools like Cloudflare to uh block
it. Then there was like um then there's
this other reason why Cloudflare doesn't
work for us, the initiative that they
put out because they have this one where
they'll they'll negotiate the the
payment for you.
It's that um Medium I think and I think
we're the only platform that wants to do
do this is we want if we get any money
out of these AI companies, we want to
give all of it back to the creators.
Like so far every other platform has
been doing side deals and then just
pocketing the money and like I don't
that doesn't make sense to me. Medium's
never been in the uh sell your data
business anyways and it's not our like
we don't own this content. I don't know
even know how we could sell it but you
know people are are um other companies
have tried to do it that way and so
we're
>> which is like Reddit
>> I think. So yeah that's what it that's
what the press releases made it seem
like. Um, and so I think not only I
don't know why I'm so comat combative.
It's like not only are we trying to
shame the AI companies, we're trying to
shame the other like social media
platforms that like it's like we're all
in a position to negotiate on behalf of
our content creators. Like I want I'm in
the business of negotiating for our
writers to get some compensation out of
these AI companies. If we can do that,
the intention is just to pass it
directly back to them. My CFO is like a
like like just shake me every time she
hears me say this. She's like, "Well,
shouldn't we like
>> take that money?"
>> Not just that, but it's like, "Okay,
look, if we have like significant legal
fees, yes, like uh we'll cover costs."
Fine. Fine. But um yeah, I think it's
just really important that um we get
back to those incentives for all
creators, not just writers. Otherwise,
they're going to disappear. Like the
thing that we love, this internet, it
will disappear if you take all the
incentives away. And uh and so it's not
just I don't actually don't understand
why the AI companies aren't more
worried. I think they're building
something on a very shaky foundation
because like these new rag based
searches where they're doing all this
research for you like the the
information they're pulling in it is
literally going to stop showing up on
the internet and it's like chatpt will
give you good advice for 2025 and
earlier but nothing beyond that.
>> I don't think they care because they
could just hire people to write directly
for them. That's what that they're
already doing that basically through
third parties like with scale. So,
doesn't seem like they're too worried.
>> They never present as worried about
anything other than
>> I guess when you're you're happy to
raise $40 billion a year and then lose a
hundred billion dollars in fiveyear
period.
>> I wouldn't
>> you're chill.
>> I that that style of business is uh
beyond me.
>> Not your thing. Yeah. All right. I want
to take a quick break and then talk to
you a little bit about why I as an
independent publisher am happy to play
ball with AI companies and want my stuff
to appear even without compensation in
places like Chat GPT and then of course
I want to talk to you a little bit about
what Medium is and how it's different
from Substack which is something that
I'm sure some of our listeners have
questions about. So let's do that right
after this. And we're back here on Big
Technology Podcast with Medium CEO Tony
Stubble. Tony, uh, before the break, I
talked a little bit about how I am an
independent publisher. I'm on Medium.
I'm on Substack. And I kind of want
these AI bots to crawl. I think I'll
have an advantage if the AI bots crawl
my content. And that is because it seems
to me more and more that the way that
people are getting information is
through these AI chatbots. It's not a
majority of search by any means. Uh it's
not anywhere close. But Tigd does have
700 million monthly users or weekly
users and Gemini has lots of users.
Meta's uh tool is starting to increase
in usage. Um
>> if people are talking about talking to
these bots uh more and more about things
that I cover, I want my my work to be a
source there. Uh a because it is already
starting to drive some referral traffic.
I'm seeing cha as a source for paid
subscribers uh for big technology. But
also if you think about again this
reason of like why people who write and
create content do what they do is they
want to have it reach other humans and
now a good channel is through these
bots.
>> So here's the I have data on this happy
to share it. Um so chat GPD is about 1%
of what we see from Google right now. So
not nothing. Um, and but the thing
that's really important to us is that it
converts into paid subscribers four
times higher than Google traffic. So I
think it maybe more accurate to say for
what you know from a business standpoint
and like what you're saying too about
having paid subscribers is that chat GP
chat GPT is like 4% as big as Google
right now already. I don't I'm we're a
little bit confused by the growth curve
because um it was on a tremendous growth
curve from the fall of last year to the
spring of this year and then leveled out
and a bunch of people said, "Oh, it's
only it's all college students and it'll
pick back up when school starts again."
We haven't seen that. So, Chat GBT
jumped so fast and then it's just flat
since.
>> Okay. Um Google is almost the opposite
and um I'm hopeful uh and I think
they're making noises that you know they
don't want to destroy the internet and
they're going to um find some way to be
a better partner to the world. Um but
right now
uh you know to I would estimate that um
we lose about a 100 clicks from
traditional Google search for every one
click we get back from a Gemini summary
and that's huge and what is
what is less good than chat GPT is that
there is no difference in conversion
rate these aren't like somehow higher
intent visitors it's just suddenly a lot
less traffic. Um, and uh, I would say my
worry is even if they paid,
I think a lot of the writing that I'm
most interested in reading wouldn't
care. It wouldn't be enough because most
of the writers on the internet are not
even doing it for money. They're doing
it for validation. And um, if they don't
if they don't get readers, the sort of
the point of it goes away from for them.
But this is what I'm saying that they
will get maybe even more readers by
having their work summarized into an AI
answer.
>> Well, sure.
>> Why should they not want that?
>> Well, this is what I was getting at with
that data is that chat GPT maybe feels
additive. It's like, oh, here's another
way that another traffic channel. But if
you look at it just through the lens of
Google, it's diminishing, right? that um
that uh overall Google traffic to most
sites uh has dropped quite a bit and
like the way that Medium sees it
actually is that um our SEO
optimizations which you were noting
earlier have been effective enough to
grow Google traffic but that the
click-through rate when Gemini launched
dropped nearly in half.
>> Okay.
>> And so I think that that trade-off is
not a good trade-off. It's actually it's
you know 100 to one uh against us. Um
>> let me run this by you. If most people
like you say are writing for validation
or connection um doesn't matter that
people are going to their actual website
or reading their thoughts and
experiences at all because if if it's
really connection and validation and I'm
just like throwing this out there
because it's worth talking through
>> well we got it's subtle. We have to
tease it all out for sure. Then they're
getting that just distribute their
arguments are just being distributed
instead of their website through chatpt
where people are still reading them.
>> Are do you think you'll change how you
write to focus less on depth and more on
like kind of a memeable idea that can
travel through the AI summaries?
>> So I would say no. Um to me actually the
the best performing story uh and it's
not always like this but the best
performing story that I wrote this year
has been this story this profile that I
wrote on Dario Amund the anthropic CEO
>> uh and that that went through all
channels so through Substack uh through
Medium. Thank you. You guys highlighted
it on the SEO is better on Medium.
>> Yeah, great SEO on Medium. Um obviously
we put on YouTube, we put on the
podcast. um you don't always get that
return on a on a story that you work a
couple months for and that's really
frustrating but when it works it's
really great. So that to me was you know
indicative of like maybe that's that's
the direction and this this these idea
this idea of writing this memeable
content that gets produced that gets put
forward in um AI engines is less
exciting to me I guess. Well, uh, I got
my start in media at in media
essentially working for this tech
publisher, O'Reilly, back before Stack
Overflow existed. Like the internet was
built by people that had O'Reilly books
on their shelf, right? Oh, yeah.
>> And I was there in that era. And what I
liked about the founder Tim O'Reilly is
like, you know, essentially the business
was selling the most in-depth
information possible, like the best
books with the best like the best
authors and the best tech reviewers,
like really good highquality stuff. But
he was also in the business of trying to
name things because if he thought I
think if he could name it, he could then
build a business, you know, underneath
it. So like O'Reilly coined the phrase
web 2.0 and then had a conference
business behind it, right?
>> And uh so it is the modern internet kind
of works both ways sometimes and maybe
sometimes people specialize but
>> uh um uh it is true that you know both
ways can be uh powerful ways to like
kind of get that validation of you
changed people's minds. Yeah.
>> Yeah. I went and visited Tim in his
Oakland home a couple years ago. Let's
see 2022. So, three years ago already.
And yeah, the story I wrote and I wrote
it for Medium was Tim O'Reilly coined
web 2.0. He thinks web 3 hype is naive.
I think he was he was right. He's he
said, "If the bubble fubble pops, are we
going to find value in those board
apes?" I don't think we did. So, okay,
Tim has been right about things for a
while.
>> Yeah. For a long time.
>> Um, but you know, it's interesting. I'm
looking at this story and it's on Medium
and it was um part of like this program
that Medium was running to get uh I
guess journalists and um
>> uh f folks of that nature to write uh
exclusively for Medium and that has
since gone away. And so, um, obviously
it, you know, I'd say looking from the
outside, it seems like Substack has, you
know, has emerged and picked up a lot of
that energy. And it leaves me wondering
where what Medium is for and who Medium
wants to serve. And now that I'm sitting
across from the CEO of Medium, I thought
this would be a good opportunity to ask.
>> I I think Medium is a place for real
people to write. And I think that um
there is a space on the internet for
professional writers. And it's kind of
amazing
um how that class of writers is growing
right now. Um but those people should be
using specialized tools and I think
Substack is one of them. Patreon kit um
uh Gumroad, right? Like these are all
paths to professionalize your life. But
your your average person, most people,
the majority of people are not trying to
quit their day job to be content
creators. And what I what we what it
looked like to us is that the internet
had really shifted to serve um content
mills, content creators, uh in pe
independent media people like you, which
you would qualify for, right?
>> Yeah, definitely in that category. Not
content mill but independent creator.
>> You qualify as indies to be clear,
right? And like like and you must like
feel like so much opportunity that you
don't have to be, you know, like doing
your profession in this like big
corporate ecosystem that maybe is like
stifling and also not always stable,
right?
>> That's a good read.
>> And um but that's not the majority of
the internet and that's not the part of
the internet that I fell in love with.
What I fell in love with was the idea
that every single person is learning
something just through the act of their
life that's worth sharing and that other
people would get value from. Like we we
threw the word validation around a
couple times like that's really
validating just about the act of living.
And sometimes the lessons are quite
trivial, but this is the thing I learned
from Tim O'Reilly is you don't get a
journalist to write a book about
programming. You get a programmer to
write a book about programming. That's
like that's not uh that that idea of I
could learn how to do my job because
someone else who ha who's better at my
job is just happens to be writing about
it on the internet. Like that's the most
commercially viable content on the
internet. Like I hate to break it to you
to anyone that's like trying to like
make a go of it, dude. like people with
killer jobs sharing how to do it. Like
um everyone makes money on that because
it's like the readers want to pay for
it. The people publishing it, they get
paid in the secondary like they get paid
on reputation. They get paid a lot of
times they're just uh a lot of great
writers are doing it to try to get
people to come work for them. So they're
advertising like, "Hey, I'm a good
person to work for." or they go
independent and they're working as like
business consultants or whatnot. So like
that that group is not trying to be a be
on the content treadmill cuz by
definition their value comes from not
being on the content treadmill. It comes
from being like living somewhere, right?
like and I just I'd always rather hear
from someone
um that's so busy living that they don't
have time to learn all these internet
games. And so like the the number one
thing I did with at Medium, which was
all based on lessons that had uh I'd
learned by being a partner to Medium
before I was the CEO, is just to switch
us and be clear. We're not uh um we're
focused on real people and regular
people, which does not mean average. I
mean, a lot of them are spectacularly
informed. But if we can serve them and
be the best place for them to write,
then we're golden. And so then all of
this like the professional class, you're
you're um a small but welcome part of
our community, but not the core of it.
>> Yeah. No, it's it's not news to me that
those the programmers are the best folks
to write about programming because
>> I mean the proof is if you look at the
Substack leaderboard actually like
they're two of the top three um are
Gerge oros and Alex Yu who both write
about Gerge writes about engineering,
Alex writes about systems. So what
you're saying is instead of having the
people who've left like those
programming jobs and want to do that
professionally, you would rather have
like one programmer who like is doing
this full-time
>> look at Medium as a place to write about
something that they know expertly but
without the interest of being a
professional content creator. So they
wouldn't want to start a substack.
>> There's um this there's a skill in being
an everyday writer is that you have to
manufacture some something to write
about. And I I like hearing from people
that didn't have to like manufacture
anything. It's just like when you have
something to say, say it. And if it's a
while till you have something to say
again, that's fine, too. That's healthy.
>> Yeah. I mean, that was my original use
case for Medium. I've been writing on
Medium. So, it's 20 25
>> I think since 200.
>> Yeah.
>> 10 11
>> and it was these I was I was not a
professional writer. I was marketing and
sales and just like doing these oneoffs
like
>> um you know things that I observed that
I thought might be interesting. I was
using a lot of different platforms,
Medium and Tumblr and stuff, but I was
like putting some good stuff I think
some of my best stuff on Medium because
I knew that there was a chance that that
algorithm would show it to more people.
It worked well with Twitter and
>> yeah,
>> and I think it's actually what got me
like
>> um when I got hired at BuzzFeed to be a
reporter in San Francisco. I was a
reporter at age at the time, but I'm
pretty sure it was the stuff I was
writing on Medium that caught the
attention of the editors there and got
me that full-time job.
>> Writing is like the universal portfolio
and that is also one of the innovations
of tech is that people started moving
from résumés to portfolios. GitHub is a
portfolio for engineers. Dribble is a
portfolio for designers. But if those
don't work for you, just write about
your job and that can be a portfolio for
you. And I like I love to hire people
who I can read how they think and how
they approach a problem be like that's
way more informative than where they had
worked, right? And what bullet points
they put on their resume. Um
yeah,
>> but
>> but what
>> my counterpoint would be that you need
news on on a platform like yours. Well,
I think so actually let's talk this
through because
>> to me like one of the biggest moments of
medium history I'm curious what you
think about this was like when uh was it
Jay Carney at Amazon and
Obama or No, he was working for Obama.
Jay Carney was doing this back and
forth.
>> Let me make sure I have this right now.
Now I see I'm really showing because I
can't remember exactly what happened.
>> I feel like I have to feel like I might
fall down on some key part of medium
history here.
>> Okay. Okay. So Oh, all right. Here it
was. The New York Times wrote a story
about how uh people at Amazon were
crying at their desks.
>> Yeah. And the entire battle back and
forth uh actually happened on Medium
where um the uh Jay Carney, the the uh
person running public affairs at Amazon,
>> um wrote this post what the New York
Times didn't tell you. Then Dean McCay,
the editor at the time, wrote a response
to that. And then there's Jay Carney. He
wrote a comment based off of uh what
Dean McCay wrote. All this happened on
Medium. And the interesting thing to me
is that there was the urgency there
because the news was taking place on it.
And that when you saw people like uh
like like Jay Carney and Dean Beccay
going back and forth.
>> Yeah.
>> It made you want to write stuff on
Medium because you knew it had that
>> ability to blow up. But maybe I'm just
looking at that from a journalist
perspective and I'm not seeing the big
picture.
>> Well, uh th this is the sort of the
op-ed of the internet sort of vibe that
medium sometimes has. Uh where you know
Jay Carney is not building an audience.
He's not hustling
uh to be an everyday content creator.
That's actually this is one of the use
cases uh for Medium. It's just not the
daily use case, right? Like how like how
many people per month on Medium are
fighting some, you know, public dust up,
you know, very few. Like I don't even
think this doesn't even cross my radar
like once a month. But now that you like
bring it up as a pattern Yeah. I mean,
look, Jeff uh Jeff Bezos had an affair
that he posted about on Medium, right?
And uh because it was about to leak
through the National Enquirer. I've seen
Tony Robbins defend him.
>> Was it an affair or was it the the food
photos or something?
>> I'm sorry, Jeff Bezos.
>> It was It was really It was actually
quite a good Basos. Speaking of good
writing, I mean,
>> Bezos is a great writer. Exactly. That
was very well written,
>> right?
>> I think it was uh anyway, I won't won't
say the title. I think it was
>> I've seen the CEO of Carta, you know,
use Medium that way. It happens. And I
think it's like what's nice is to go to
a platform that's going to elevate a
story based on the the merit of that
story rather than how much audience
you've already built. So, it is actually
like a good place to just land if you
have just one major thing to write. And
um I was thinking for us what we would
say the most newsworthy stuff was the
start of COVID cuz there was a a lot of
really big COVID information that um was
coming from people thankfully who
weren't in the audience building game
and but were doing pretty deep research
and analysis and posting it on Medium.
>> Yeah, I remember reading those posts. It
was fascinating. Well, look, as a Happy
Medium uh user, publisher, and reader,
um
>> I want to say thank you for your time
and uh I think it's it's you're
profitable and it's not going anywhere,
right?
>> It's better than that. I think it's like
we had a rough a rough stretch. We got
out of it. We we're profitable and then
this like we're trying to say like we're
not competing with the creator economy.
And for a while, one of the things that
people don't see is how many people are
writing on Medium. It had been flat
during our struggles and it's like our
writer numbers are 50% higher than they
were on January 1st and that's because
we got out of
>> like kind of being in this weird
competition that we didn't want to be in
and now we're back to being just being
like like a place to just go and start
writing and not having to worry about
all that other stuff.
>> Yeah, it's interesting because uh for me
so Medium after starting big technology,
Medium was my first contract.
>> Yeah.
>> First. So that was signing a contract
with Medium was like the first moment
where I was like maybe this will work.
That was in 2020.
>> Then you came in and canceled it and I
said, you know what,
>> I'm not the one who canceled it, but I
agree with the cancellation. It wasn't
right for us.
>> Once you came in that the program that I
was in went away,
>> but I and you know what I said? I said I
said it's fine though because it's one
of those things where I was like
>> I I I obviously would love to have kept
and I'm still publishing on Medium, just
not as much. I would have loved to have
kept going. Um,
>> but now, you know, seeing the direction
you've gone, hearing you talk through,
because we've spoken a couple times now,
both on mic and and not, um,
>> it it makes a lot of sense that you're
taking it this direction as opposed to
what could have been.
>> Yeah.
>> And also ran crater economy company
that's just running after the substacks.
Who wants to do that?
>> Yeah.
>> So, anyway, I wish I think cuz we had
hired so many journalists and then let
them go. there's this like lingering bad
blood which you're not presenting.
>> I do not I seriously don't I respect the
direction that you guys went. I have no
bad blood and I think both of our
businesses are okay.
>> Yeah. I I I want to like always try to
have some Yes. And it's like yes I want
professional media to exist and thrive
and
>> Medium has a different business. Like
we're not the ones that are going to
make that happen.
>> Um so
>> well it's good to see everything going
as planned and good luck on your
continuing fight against AI slav. I
appreciate it.
>> All right,
>> great discussion. Thank you for having
me.
>> Great. All right, everybody. The
website's medium.com. Go check it out.
All right. Thank you all for listening.
We'll see you next time on Big
Technology Podcast.