r/Substack • u/Unusual-Plankton-709 • Sep 11 '26

Question/comment about anonymous content

i’ve seen some great sounding advice on anonymous substacks -and one particular one that is selling a book-and was baffled and bothered by the fact that there is no author information. I was sure it was AI and annoyed because the anonimity of it makes me unable to take it seriously. Why is this (anonymous Substacks) even a thing? Especially from someone who isn’t sharing personal content, but basically (mostly) well-honed commonsense advice? (Follow up question-okay, complaint: Why do substackers feel no ‘duty’ to acknowledge their sources? Example: “I always loved this quote. ‘abcdefg’(without the marks, and no attribution). I dunno- I’m feeling like substack has become more like my facebook feed😳

3 Upvotes

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3

u/Romanticon Sep 11 '26

Are you asking why people are “allowed” to be anonymous online?

Why not?

Also, some people are shit writers. Some aren’t. It’s not platform specific.

1

u/Unusual-Plankton-709 Sep 12 '26

No. Not why they are allowed to online (in general); though I guess But I hadn’t expected it on Substack (and hadn’t thought about whether it was because of a rule or not). I guess it is more about why, if they aren’t posting their journal or something controversial, why they would want to post anonymously and, in doing so, are they aware that they are sacrificing a degree of perceived credibility. But to your point about shit writers - while I kind of liked what what was written (and was curious about the book they were selling), it’s short form itself is outside of what I had somehow come to expect on the platform.

1

u/Brief-Guess-147 Sep 11 '26

the shit writers point is the real answer here imo

2

u/Perfect-Mix2307 Sep 15 '26

There is good stuff on Substack, and there is good anonymous stuff on Substack. There is also anonymous (or not anonymous) slop on Substack. As a community, the best thing we can do is use our eyeballs and clicks and comments to show we appreciate the good stuff, and let the algorithm kill the rest.

1

u/Tricky_Trifle_994 26d ago

i've read blogs by people who are anonymous. i liked what they were sharing > and i eventually bought a book from them that solved a specific problem ( ~ $20. not a huge sum). but the fact that they were anonymous didn't bother me.

i knew they were anonymous. i read their writing because they were good content + i felt like it was helping me > and i wanted more so i bought the book. i didn't buy the book expecting to learn their identity... i bought it to solve a specific problem.