My friend Neale Adams is a professional writer who now in retirement finds that writing is in his blood and feels compelled to continue to exercise his craft even though it may now be without financial compensation, but in declaring his plan for writing he indicates that it is important for him to have a responsive (or at least appreciative) audience.
The desire for audience is also expressed by another writing friend of mine, Geoffrey Keyte, who I have long hoped would see the value of making his work accessible online rather than just all in privately circulated print format.
But for me, although I would welcome (and regret the lack of) a sense that I was actually communicating with others, the primary purpose of my own writing is to clarify thoughts in my own mind. Some of that writing might actually be of interest (I hope) but much is just reaction to the writing of others and/or is too cryptic for a wider audience. So I do not agree with Neale’s assertion that “As with speech, the audience is others” . In fact many years ago I wrote that “Not having an audience, I don’t really have the option to persuade anyone, so for me it’s more about clarification and reinforcement of my own thoughts and ideas – and protection against the fear that I will forget them.” And even earlier I wrote something similar.
However, I do value communication and feedback, and once had hopes that the trackback and RSS features of early Blogging technology and would allow the development of a robust network for the exchange of written ideas. Perhaps it did for a while, but hopes were dashed when the owners and controllers of the RSS communication infrastructure saw less profit in such a network of independently hosted sites than in their own “walled gardens” – and/or when people like me became too lazy to manage their own email newsletters. The possible good news on that score is that the Substack platform provides tools for writers to email news of their content to subscription lists (and if interested to collect fees from their subscribers) – and of course also to host and manage comments on their work.
Up to now I have only used Substack to read and comment on the work of others but if I were to use it for building an audience for some more substantial efforts then perhaps a post such as this might be a good place to start.
Source: Neale’s blog: A plan for writing