It's true that "post consistently" is both good advice and part of why Matt is so successful, but the Washington Post profile and this item utterly fail to grasp the several ways that his writing is much better than most of what is published on the subjects that he writes about. By "better" I do not mean "asserts opinions that I agree wi…
It's true that "post consistently" is both good advice and part of why Matt is so successful, but the Washington Post profile and this item utterly fail to grasp the several ways that his writing is much better than most of what is published on the subjects that he writes about. By "better" I do not mean "asserts opinions that I agree with." I disagree with Matt a lot about various values questions and policy questions. What I mean is that is he much better versed in the nuances of policy debates than the vast majority of policy writers; that his arguments are logically sound and internally consistent much more than most pundits; that he tends to offer evidence for assertions that he makes; and that he is more willing than most people to follow his ideas where they lead and to be forthright about the critiques that he is making even though, as a consequence, lots of people who are unable to distinguish between *disagrees with me* and *is writing in bad faith* or *should feel shame* yell at him online. It is not entirely surprising that these strengths of Matt go unmentioned in the Washington Post profile because as a piece it possesses none of them.
Conor gets it exactly right here. Max and the Post profile are both absolutely right about the importance of regular, frequent posting, but Matt isn't successful simply because he posts so often. He is so successful because he posts incredibly high quality content (along all the dimensions Conor names) AND because he posts so frequently. It's really quite astounding.
A great comparison is Jonathan Chait, who I think writes content that is of similar quality to Matt's. And while both of them are folks I agree with a lot, Chait is someone who I generally enjoy more for a few reasons (he's closer to my age, is an actual sports fan, shares my understanding for why charters are so important, and has a better sense of humor). Having said all that, if I had to choose to read only one or the other, there is no doubt that it would be Matt. Because as much as I like Chait, I'm guessing he writes only a quarter as often.
If he wrote less often, I'm sure Matt could raise the average quality of his pieces a bit. What's extraordinary about Matt is that he's able to keep his quality at such a high bar despite writing as often as he does.
Just one more point. The only blogger I have read that is comparable to Matt in terms of being able to write incredibly frequently while maintaining a high bar for quality was Andrew Sullivan at the height of the Daily Dish.
Having said that, comparing the two is instructive. Andrew is the more gifted writer, and his abillity to speak personally and from the heart takes his writing at times to a height that I don't think Matt has ever reached. But Andrew is also all over the place depending on his mood, gets things genuinely wrong in a way that Matt does not, and ended up having to retire from regular writing for a long time (and now writes far less frequently with more vacations from ever) because he couldn't sustain that pace. And yet Matt keeps going year after year after year without the quality of his work ever faltering. It really is impressive.
It's true that "post consistently" is both good advice and part of why Matt is so successful, but the Washington Post profile and this item utterly fail to grasp the several ways that his writing is much better than most of what is published on the subjects that he writes about. By "better" I do not mean "asserts opinions that I agree with." I disagree with Matt a lot about various values questions and policy questions. What I mean is that is he much better versed in the nuances of policy debates than the vast majority of policy writers; that his arguments are logically sound and internally consistent much more than most pundits; that he tends to offer evidence for assertions that he makes; and that he is more willing than most people to follow his ideas where they lead and to be forthright about the critiques that he is making even though, as a consequence, lots of people who are unable to distinguish between *disagrees with me* and *is writing in bad faith* or *should feel shame* yell at him online. It is not entirely surprising that these strengths of Matt go unmentioned in the Washington Post profile because as a piece it possesses none of them.
Conor gets it exactly right here. Max and the Post profile are both absolutely right about the importance of regular, frequent posting, but Matt isn't successful simply because he posts so often. He is so successful because he posts incredibly high quality content (along all the dimensions Conor names) AND because he posts so frequently. It's really quite astounding.
A great comparison is Jonathan Chait, who I think writes content that is of similar quality to Matt's. And while both of them are folks I agree with a lot, Chait is someone who I generally enjoy more for a few reasons (he's closer to my age, is an actual sports fan, shares my understanding for why charters are so important, and has a better sense of humor). Having said all that, if I had to choose to read only one or the other, there is no doubt that it would be Matt. Because as much as I like Chait, I'm guessing he writes only a quarter as often.
If he wrote less often, I'm sure Matt could raise the average quality of his pieces a bit. What's extraordinary about Matt is that he's able to keep his quality at such a high bar despite writing as often as he does.
Just one more point. The only blogger I have read that is comparable to Matt in terms of being able to write incredibly frequently while maintaining a high bar for quality was Andrew Sullivan at the height of the Daily Dish.
Having said that, comparing the two is instructive. Andrew is the more gifted writer, and his abillity to speak personally and from the heart takes his writing at times to a height that I don't think Matt has ever reached. But Andrew is also all over the place depending on his mood, gets things genuinely wrong in a way that Matt does not, and ended up having to retire from regular writing for a long time (and now writes far less frequently with more vacations from ever) because he couldn't sustain that pace. And yet Matt keeps going year after year after year without the quality of his work ever faltering. It really is impressive.