How services like Cameo and Substack have opened up new ways for prominent media figures and journalists to make a living from smaller audiences
a new way for notable individuals to present custom tailored insights and information. It is part of a platform liberation process that will allow valuable journalists, artists, actors—any creative to reach a one-to-one audience. https://twitter.com/... Carter Thomas / @carterthomas : Joe Rogan + Call Her Daddy are important milestones As many shift to virtual communication we should see: - confidence in the ability to produce content online - a willingness to pay for others' premium content I also think ppl will scroll/browse less https://www.nytimes.com/... @nytimes : “In the mainstream heart of the media business, both artists and writers are moving quickly to find new business models as huge swaths of the media business have been wounded or shut down by the coronavirus pandemic,” writes Ben Smith. https://www.nytimes.com/... Dave Ambrose / @daveambrose : .@BookCameo is on pace to bring in over $100mm in bookings this year and $25mm in revenues “the company's weekly bookings have grown to 70,000 from about 9,000 in early January” 👀 to experience momentum like this for a model 3 years old https://www.nytimes.com/... Abhijit Bhaduri / @abhijitbhaduri : “Individuality is a feature - not a bug” in the #PassionEconomy says @ljin18 via @a16z https://a16z.com/... Today @nytimes talked about it https://www.nytimes.com/... https://twitter.com/... Steven Galanis / @mr312 : Great @benyt piece in @nytimes about @BookCameo and the emerging ecosystem around direct to consumer monetization for content creators that @ljin18 dubs, “The Passion Economy.” https://www.nytimes.com/... Ross Hoffman / @hoff : 1/ Great read on the creator economy. https://www.nytimes.com/.... Investors have shunnned the media space over the years, calling most properties “sub scale” but times are changing. Alexis Ohanian Sr. / @alexisohanian : Crazy to think that people are still learning about @Patreon — this has been the financial infrastructure for a generation of culture-creators for the last decade from @IssaRae to @amandapalmer to @humansofny - it's powering the #SecondRenaissance https://www.nytimes.com/... Anne Helen Petersen / @annehelen : “Every celebrity is really a gig economy worker” https://www.nytimes.com/... Sajith Pai / @sajithpai : The 11th highest earning newsletter by @emorwee makes $175,000 a year, from 2,500 subscribers. @Kevin2Kelly (1000 true fans) was right. via https://www.nytimes.com/... https://twitter.com/... @jeremysliew : .@BookCameo's bookings have grown from $9k/week in early Jan to $70k/week now, according to the @nytimes https://www.nytimes.com/... https://twitter.com/... Taylor Lorenz / @taylorlorenz : If you want to understand the success of Rogan I suggest reading @benyt which actually takes a thoughtful and reported look at these big shifts in media https://www.nytimes.com/... Isaac Fitzgerald / @isaacfitzgerald : Kelci Saffery of Tiger King fame has earned $17K on Cameo. 🐅🖤✨ Read @benyt on how the business of “digital direct payments” is shifting the already constantly shifting media landscape: https://twitter.com/... Andrew Feinberg / @andrewfeinberg : In which Ben, who was lucky enough to escape his less financially stable ex-employer for a cushy @nytimes gig argues that laid off journos whose employers folded or cut back & can't find new FT work because news is dying will be ok because a few folks make money with Substack. https://twitter.com/... Alex Kantrowitz / @kantrowitz : This paragraph on @SubstackInc is key. You can see why it's so appealing to journalists in an unstable moment in media. “Substack represents a radically different alternative, in which the “media company” is a service and the journalists are in charge.” https://twitter.com/... Alex Kantrowitz / @kantrowitz : This column from @benyt is a must-read on the quiet seismic shift taking place in the media industry today. “Media company stars, with big social media followings and more and more ways to make money, are less and less willing to act like employees.” https://www.nytimes.com/... Sriram Krishnan / @sriramk : Fantastic @benyt piece today on the changing world of media. And great mentions for Cameo's @Mr312 , Substack, @ljin18 and many others. https://www.nytimes.com/... Antonio Garca Martnez / @antoniogm : Interesting take by @benyt on the ‘celebrity creative’ culture, and the startups springing up to monetize them (and help them monetize). https://www.nytimes.com/... See also Mediagazer
Context & Ripple Effects
This NYT piece lands at the start of the direct-monetization arc: Cameo's reported growth from roughly 9,000 to 70,000 weekly bookings — pacing toward $100M in bookings on ~$25M of revenue — and Substack's rise together show that a creator no longer needs mass reach, just enough fans willing to pay one-to-one. The framing that matters is Substack-as-tool: writers are 'sovereign,' paid directly by subscribers rather than through an institution, as argued in Stratechery's defense of Substack.
What came after tests whether that model holds at scale. A later profile of Substack has its founders insisting it is a platform, not a media company, while the company ultimately walked away from fundraising talks at a $750M-$1B valuation after reporting only ~$9M in 2021 revenue — evidence that enabling individual earnings is easier than building a big business doing it. Meanwhile Forbes moved to co-opt the model with a salary-plus-revenue-split newsletter service, keeping talent inside an institution.
First-order effects
- Prominent journalists and media figures gain a viable path off institutional payrolls: a few thousand direct subscribers or Cameo bookings can replace a salary, decoupling income from audience size.
- BookCameo's jump to tens of thousands of weekly bookings shows celebrities converting fan access into recurring, priced transactions rather than free social-media presence.
Second-order effects
- Legacy publishers are forced to compete for talent on new terms — Forbes responded with a hybrid offering that pairs a salary and benefits with a revenue split on journalists' own newsletters, effectively matching the indie model inside the brand.
- Platforms like Substack face a moderation identity crisis: if writers are sovereign customers rather than content under editorial control, the publisher's traditional gatekeeping role — and liability posture — erodes.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, media careers restructure around personal brands: the individual becomes the business unit, and institutions become optional distribution and benefits layers — with the discomfort artists already feel about influencer-style self-promotion as the cultural friction point.
- The economics stay unresolved: Substack's modest revenue against its once-sought valuation suggests creator platforms may enable many small livelihoods without becoming large companies themselves, pushing the industry toward a long tail of independent earners rather than a new media giant.
The trend: Media income is migrating from institutions to individuals who monetize small, paying audiences directly, with platforms recast as neutral tools and publishers forced to buy back loyalty with hybrid deals.