Keep it Simple
Aemula Writer Spotlight - 10.23.25
Our modern media environment has grown to incredible complexity, comprised of fragile, disjointed ecosystems that relay and revise information as it circulates around the web. The advent of AI only exacerbates this fragile complexity, with a recent NewsGuard audit showing that LLMs such as ChatGPT and Perplexity spread false claims from news sources more than 40% of the time, double the rate from the previous year.
As with any complex system, intricacies create vulnerabilities. With more moving parts, you have more potential points of failure. This holds true for car engines, investment strategies, and global supply chains, but in each of these instances it is easy to tell when things begin to break down.
Information systems are much more intangible, making it difficult to notice when they begin to fail. However, if you know where to look, you can begin to investigate the cracks forming in the media machine. We only have to assume the effects we would expect to see if our information environment was deteriorating, such as deteriorating trust in our sources of news, less communication between ideologies, and more inflammatory rhetoric.
We can study these trends, as has been done in the above-linked resources, but we can also intuitively feel the consequences of our eroded access to high-quality information. Stable democracies rely on a well-informed public. When that foundation collapses, we begin to see rising tensions in our political environments. Globally, we are seeing reversions to nationalism, increases in political violence, and suppression of freedom of speech. Continuing down this path risks destabilizing our interconnected global economy and escalating violent conflict, threatening modern quality of life at unprecedented scale.
Fortunately, there is an easy solution. We can simplify the media environment and remove the points of weakness that have led to the problems we see today. We have the technology to create cohesive and incentive-aligned infrastructure for reporting and distributing high-quality news. Readers can freely explore the full diversity of perspectives through a single subscription, all without facing the inherent negative tradeoffs of traditional, centralized newsrooms. Journalists simply communicate directly with their audience, no additional layers of complex intermediaries.
With a transparent, trustworthy, and community-governed media system, we can solve the fundamental issues that underpin our precarious information ecosystem.
This week, we highlight writers who are discussing the complexities and shortfalls of our current media environment. We encourage you to explore their work and consider subscribing directly!
One more week remaining in our $5,000 Essay Contest! If you are writing on Substack or have an article to share, no matter the topic, publish to Aemula in seconds and immediately enter to win the $5,000!
Against the Grain
Written by Kelly Johnston, a former food lobbyist, Secretary of the US Senate, congressional staffer, and statehouse journalist, sharing insight at the intersection of politics, policy, and history while encouraging civil discourse.
Now available to read on Aemula!
“You may not like these regulations. You may see them as an affront to the First Amendment. You might even want to abolish the Federal Communications Commission. You are welcome to hold those views and express them, and I understand the case; I might even agree with you, to a point. And given the growth and spread of alternative or “streaming” media, a case can be made that the FCC’s regulation of the airwaves is increasingly irrelevant. But until the law is changed or the agency is abolished or reformed, Nexstar and Sinclair, along with ABC’s owner Disney, were within their right to suspend Kimmel.”
Derek Thompson
Eponymously written by Derek Thompson, a bestselling author, longtime Atlantic writer, and host of the Plain English podcast, whose work explores abundance, technology, and the shifting social fabric of modern life with a mix of curiosity, skepticism, and clarity.
“In the last few weeks, I have been writing a lot about two big trends in American life that do not necessarily overlap. My work on the “Antisocial Century” traces the rise of solitude in American life and its effects on economics, politics, and society. My work on “the end of thinking” follows the decline of literacy and numeracy scores in the U.S. and the handoff from a culture of literacy to a culture of orality. Neither of these trends is exclusively caused by the logic of television colonizing all media. But both trends are significantly exacerbated by it.”
One Thing
Written by Kyle Chayka, a freelance journalist, critic, and author of Filterworld: How Algorithms Flattened Culture and The Longing for Less: Living with Minimalism, along with Nate Gallant, a writer covering religion, aesthetics, and politics, with experience as a Japanese, Chinese, and Tibetan to English translator, previously featured in our spotlight, “Evolving Landscape”.
“It’s hard for audiences to find voices and publications they trust right now, and it’s hard to find the one voice or publication that suits you for one flavor of content: your go-to guy(s) for fashion, for music, for art, for politics, for business. We (media creators) should be making it easier and simpler by intentionally gathering our audiences and holding them close, no matter if that’s millions of people or hundreds — developing our brand identities and sticking to them, delivering on our promises.”
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Link your Substack to your Aemula account using this link or send a quick email to writers@aemula.com to get started!
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