When I do an interview, or I guest on a podcast, it never feels like it’s enough of a thing to post about it in my blog. It feels like the sort of thing I should just drop into Threads.
The thing is, Threads suppresses the everlivingfuck out of almost everything I post, lately. It tells me that a little over 1.2 million accounts follow mine, but it typically only shows what I post to an average of about 3000 people. If a post is doing extremely well, it will climb up to 20,000. That’s not nothing, to be sure, but it’s a tiny fraction of the accounts that have expressed a desire to see what I post. It’s incredibly frustrating. We have given away so much of our ability to connect to each other, to communicate with each other, to these profoundly evil and destructive companies that are profiting from our dysregulation.
I wonder if anyone outside of the weird little silos the algorithms create and sort us into even see what we post? Or are we just telling other people who are already furious about the Cornell 7, the murder of Nolan Wells, the endless murders by ICE, the rampant and unchecked construction of fucking concentration camps full of children who are raped by ICE thugs things we already know. I wonder if the evil human rights abusers who sit atop these companies will ever be held accountable for their roles in all of this violence and destruction.
Like, there was real promise in decentralized communication, and we saw entire countries use it to rise up and depose the despots who had been standing on their necks for a generation. Of course it was shitty American Capitalists who saw that, recognized it as a threat to their hegemony, and put us where we are right now.
I don’t know that we will ever be able to undo this, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try. And I am trying today because I realized something last night while I was very successfully not falling asleep for my second hour: there are more actual humans subscribed to my blog posts than the stupid algorithm shows my posts to on Threads. If I have something to say, something fun or cool I want to share, even if it is just a quick thing, a couple of links, a stray thought with something interesting at its end, I will just make a post here, and show it to all of you.
So, to that end, a few fun things I’ve done lately that I wanted to share:
Years ago, I spoke with John Moe for his program, The Hilarious World of Depression. At that time, I wasn’t aware of the root causes of my mental illness, so we didn’t talk about CPTSD or child abuse, or any of the things I do to work toward healing that part of my life. I’m happy to say that I recently talked with John for a follow-up. His show is now a podcast that you can get wherever you prefer. And while you are there, you can also grab an episode of Sleeping With Celebrities that I did. If you’re unfamiliar (as I was), it’s a podcast designed to help you fall asleep, a soothing conversation about something I care about a lot, delivered in a way that should help ease you to sleep. I talked all about this old TV show I love, The Prisoner.
I did an interview with The Advocate, too, talking about my experiences as an ally, and why being othered in my life pushed me to stand up for people without my privilege.
“The only way I could be a more protected class of citizen in America is if I were an openly performative Christian nationalist. I’m white. I’m male. I’m upper middle class. I’m semi-famous. I have all kinds of privilege. And yet, I’ve been othered my entire life,” Wheaton says.
“I was othered by my parents. I was othered by people in my neighborhood. I was othered on the set,” he adds, explaining that his Star Trek castmates were the exception.
“And when I see other people experiencing that, I cannot help myself. I have to throw myself between those people and the people who are hurting them,” he says. “I’m standing up for my younger self in ways that no one ever, ever did.”
Wheaton offers this promise to the trans community: “Sometimes people who won’t hear you will hear me, even when we’re saying the same thing. And if I can use that privilege to reach that person and make a change, that’s one less person who fucking hassles you for existing.”
Okay, finally, I wanted to draw your attention to last week’s episode of It’s Storytime With Wil Wheaton, The Glass City by AnaMaria Curtis.
If I described for you a sailor, stranded on an island, a thousand miles of ocean in every direction, it would be easy for you to imagine that person’s sense of loneliness. If I described for you a businessman, who has been on the road for a month straight, sleeping in hotels that blur together and smear across the same lobby restaurant over and over again, some of you could probably relate to and imagine that. If I told you about someone who has been Othered, in their family or in their community, told you how they sat in their bedroom with the door closed and wished that anyone would see them, some of you will, unfortunately, understand precisely. I grew up knowing that particular flavor of loneliness all too well. Even now, as happy and surrounded by love as I am, I can remember, and I can feel it. Loneliness is such a powerful feeling, even when it fades, some part of it lingers … at least for me, lurking, waiting, on the horizon of my memory.
This week’s Storytime is a beautiful, surreal meditation on loneliness from Ana Maria Curtis, who you may remember as the author of The Coffin Maker, a wonderful story I told you about a year ago. (If you haven’t heard it, it’s in the archive.) I’m thrilled and honored to speak her words again, and so grateful that you are choosing to hear them. I’m going to go ahead, and when you’re ready, come and meet me. I’ll be waiting for you, at The Glass City.
I just really loved this story, and I thought I did especially good work telling it. If you have some time to spend, I hope you’ll consider spending it with me.
That’s all for now. Until next time, maybe it will happen today.
Hi, I’m Wil Wheaton and I write this blog (among other things). I’m glad you are here. If you’d like to get my posts delivered to your inbox, here’s the thingy:
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Love hearing anything you have to chat about, even if it’s just a small note or something you’re excited about! That’s why we’re here 🙂
FYI, I follow you on tumblr, not here, and had no problem seeing your post that linked over here. So at least that’s in the “working properly” column.
Absolutely post the short things here that you think belong on Threads or Bluesky. Getting 4 or 5 sentences in my inbox, which specifically tells me there’s something in it from someone I specifically said I want to hear from, is a delight
Hey, yes to your blog, yes to RSS feeds (how I follow your blog), yes to remembering that the internet is actually the links between sites and that the corporate walled gardens of social media that try to keep us trapped on their platforms by any means necessary (damn the psychological and social consequences) are places designed to trick us into thinking they are the internet and THEY. ARE. NOT. The internet is a wide open place and we don’t have to restrict ourselves to only four giant websites featuring screenshots of the other three.
Hey, yes to your blog, yes to RSS feeds (how I follow your blog), yes to remembering that the internet is actually the links between sites and that the corporate walled gardens of social media that try to keep us trapped on their platforms by any means necessary (damn the psychological and social consequences) are places designed to trick us into thinking they are the internet and THEY. ARE. NOT. The internet is a wide open place and we don’t have to restrict ourselves to only four giant websites featuring screenshots of the other three.
Yes to all of this. I’m glad to know there are people who get it (and of course I’d find them in comments from RSS feeds). sigh. We are not alone (but definitely we’re a minority)
There are paragraphs and essays and even more that is unwritten and unwritable behind these two words, but for now I just wanted to say “Thank you!”
Hi Wil, I’m teaching my intro students about the concept of privilege (for a college first-year course “Speaking about Diversity” – could I share this post (with attribution) for my students? As someone with a different set of privileges than you have, it might be nice to hear it from someone like you. Thanks!
Of course! And thank you for being a teacher!
I am one of the hundreds of thousands that don’t see your posts anymore, but I DO read my email daily and I always read what you send out.
Thanks for you continued allyship, for you truth speaking and vulnerability, and you general disdain for all things right wing and shitty.
Stay pink Wil!
With love and appreciation from Canada
I am one of the hundreds of thousands that don’t see your posts anymore, but I DO read my email daily and I always read what you send out.
Thanks for you continued allyship, for you truth speaking and vulnerability, and you general disdain for all things right wing and shitty.
Stay pink Wil!
With love and appreciation from Canada
This is why I deleted Threads. I kept missing your content even as a follower. Keep these blgo posts coming!
I’ve been giving people the following advice when it comes to social media: post once, share everywhere. For you, Wil, focus on your blog. It emails out to everyone of us who subscribe. Share the posts on Threads, Mastadon, Bluesky, what-have-you, but point everyone back to your site. And to subscribing. Only then are you free from the algorithm’s capricious tyranny.
Yes, please. Share any old thing. Don’t feel pressure to polish up “content” – just… Talk to the people who’ve gathered in this space you’ve made. It helps me feel less alone too. It helps more than I can say to see reminders that other people are out there just getting one foot in front of the other each day, whatever that means for them. I appreciate the insights into your daily “walk”. When I get to read that others are having similar thoughts, and share my values (Trans rights! F*ck ICE!!) it feels like we get to walk together. Way less lonely.
I don’t even use Threads because it’s a part of Meta. No need to give that guy any more money or attention than he already has.
Seconding (thirding? is that a thing?) the request to keep on posting, even the small stuff. Especially the small stuff. The world would be a much poorer place if we all waited until we had something earth-shattering to say.
I enjoy reading your words (short or long) as much as I enjoy hearing you read others words. To heck with the algorithm- power to the people
Thank you Will. From another other. I will not stop
Believing that we will win back what has been stolen from us by people too rich to care.
Deleted my long comment before posting. Why do I treat others’ comment sections as if they’re my personal blog? Why do I so easily let the spark of another’s words trigger a disproportionate torrent of my own? Bleh.
“Trigger” may be the key word here. Wil, your words aren’t just a “Me too!” moment of shared introspection, but are also a “So THAT’S how you say it!” realization. Clarification. A needle of words that pops my unsaid balloon, releasing its content.
Thanks! Thanks for sharing, and for doing it so effectively and, at times, evocatively!
I really dislike people – both the general people described in your writing here and many of the individual people i come into contact with. But you are truly a gem, and a far away from ‘people’ as it gets. You’re just lovely. I feel incredibly glad and privileged that I found you and get to listen to your brain. Thank you for giving hope.
I’m much more likely to read you here. Keep posting!
Shared over on Bluesky. I needed to hear it today.
Blogs are the way! RSS forever!
I second that. Trying to get my friends to drop freaking social media and go back to e-mail…. so far, zero success, but I let them know where I am if they want to say something (oh, and actual phone calls are great as well).
I did this five years ago when I left social media. Told all the people there how to find my blog, waited five days and deleted all my accounts. A few people followed me. I can’t get anyone currently to sign up for email notifications on my blog. It doesn’t matter because I am a writer, so I write, even if it’s only the void (and my 57 subscribers) listening.
I’ve been following will here via RSS since way back when his website was using typepad. I know I miss stuff he writes about on social media platforms, but I despise them too much to make an exception for Wil.
I thought I was the only one introduced to The Prisoner at an impressionable young age and being completely entranced by it, despite not entirely understand it back then (and, arguably, now). Clearly that’s not the case.
I see your posts via email far before Fookbase decides to show me them.
Slap that Like button! 😀
Have you looked into Mastodon, Wil? I know everyone talks about Bluesky and Threads, but they are part of the problem to me. Owned by big companies, with their boards and algorithms. On Masto, the people are the algorithm. Someone like you would be super visible there.
Thank you for speaking about being “othered” it made me feel seen and validated. I don’t see your posts on social media anymore but I read everything in your emails. When I get an email from you, I know it’s going to be a good day, a thoughtful day, one that makes me feel connected and valid. Thank you, always. You posts are one of mine glimmers.
Oh, I love that I gave you a glimmer!
It’s funny that your posts are being throttled, because a lot of what I see in my feed is only there because you commented on it.
I’m always happy to hear from you. I’ll ever go back to social media of any kind. Not in it’s current form.
The people I’d like to hear from, like you, know where to find me.
Wil: can you please send your emails in a larger font? I’m 73 and can barely read them.
I got so sick and tired of META earlier this year I closed my IGs and kept my FB only so I could continue modding a local group. Am still on TT for the time being but it’s easy to catch community violations for absolutely nothing. If I didn’t need it for my BPD community I’d be gone from there as well.
We miss you on BlueSky
Come to the Fediverse (Mastodon), we don’t have algorithms.
The Fediverse has made it crystal clear that I am unwelcome there.
Thanks, Wil. Your voice (literal and figurative) is one of my faves.
Wil, I’ve been following you here since a few months after you started this website. I don’t comment often, but I read your posts. I get notified via RSS and I know you post things here we all need to know. I’ll take this site over social media every day of the week.
Thanks for all you do and your support of everyone. Keep posting and I’ll keep reading.