I’ll answer the last question first, because it’s easiest: BuzzFeed UK had a load of cuts in late 2017, they offered voluntary redundancy to anyone who wanted it, and I took it because I had a book to write (and because I may well have ended up losing the job anyway). After that it turned out to be pretty straightforward to get people to give me money to write things and I’m really glad I did it, but it was a half-jump half-push situation.
Biggest bottleneck: sheesh. Honestly it’s probably coming up with interesting, worthwhile ideas fast enough. But then it’s also having the time to write about them all, so there’s a tension there. I feel like I’m always desperately trying to think of the next piece, while also somehow not having time to do the longer-term projects. So, and this sounds like I’m being flippant, but I think honestly the biggest bottleneck is my own tendency to procrastinate.
HANG ON. I’m going to leave that paragraph up because I think it’s interesting, but I’ve just realised it doesn’t quite answer your question. The biggest bottleneck on IMPACT is probably readership. I can get a few tens of thousands to read a piece; a few hundreds of thousands if it goes really, really well. Assuming that piece is something I think is really important and I want to change some minds with it, what percentage of people actually will change minds? Is it double-digits? Is it even greater than one? I don’t know. So I suppose that’s the most important thing. How do I write something that is 1) about something super important 2) persuasive enough to change minds and 3) exciting enough to be widely read? there are trade-offs there.
The best changes: Hmmmmmmmmm. I am sorry, I really don’t know. I think the lack of numeracy among journalists is a real problem, and that’s why I’ve just written a book about how numbers go wrong in the news. I don’t know if it’s the most important thing, but I think it would make a real difference to public understanding if journalists started thinking about putting numbers in context, absolute vs relative risk, linking to original sources, etc etc. Just being more comfortable with and transparent about the numbers they use in reporting.
I’ll answer the last question first, because it’s easiest: BuzzFeed UK had a load of cuts in late 2017, they offered voluntary redundancy to anyone who wanted it, and I took it because I had a book to write (and because I may well have ended up losing the job anyway). After that it turned out to be pretty straightforward to get people to give me money to write things and I’m really glad I did it, but it was a half-jump half-push situation.
Biggest bottleneck: sheesh. Honestly it’s probably coming up with interesting, worthwhile ideas fast enough. But then it’s also having the time to write about them all, so there’s a tension there. I feel like I’m always desperately trying to think of the next piece, while also somehow not having time to do the longer-term projects. So, and this sounds like I’m being flippant, but I think honestly the biggest bottleneck is my own tendency to procrastinate.
HANG ON. I’m going to leave that paragraph up because I think it’s interesting, but I’ve just realised it doesn’t quite answer your question. The biggest bottleneck on IMPACT is probably readership. I can get a few tens of thousands to read a piece; a few hundreds of thousands if it goes really, really well. Assuming that piece is something I think is really important and I want to change some minds with it, what percentage of people actually will change minds? Is it double-digits? Is it even greater than one? I don’t know. So I suppose that’s the most important thing. How do I write something that is 1) about something super important 2) persuasive enough to change minds and 3) exciting enough to be widely read? there are trade-offs there.
The best changes: Hmmmmmmmmm. I am sorry, I really don’t know. I think the lack of numeracy among journalists is a real problem, and that’s why I’ve just written a book about how numbers go wrong in the news. I don’t know if it’s the most important thing, but I think it would make a real difference to public understanding if journalists started thinking about putting numbers in context, absolute vs relative risk, linking to original sources, etc etc. Just being more comfortable with and transparent about the numbers they use in reporting.