Change is coming to Truth Matters

Work on my new vision for this publication begins in earnest tomorrow. I wanted to share with you a little more of my thinking and the part I hope this community will play in helping to deliver it.

Let's grab a virtual coffee together; I have more to share about my plans for the week ahead. This is just a supplementary post; my main piece for today will arrive at the usual time.

Today marks an important moment in my journey here on Substack; I’ve spent the best part of 18 months sharing my thoughts, my worries and a little of who I am as a person. I now have a little over 550 pieces in my archive, covering a wide range of subjects from AI to China to economics and the daily chaos of US politics. It warms my soul to see so many people still here who have been on this journey with me from the beginning. Equally, it’s been great to see so many new truth seekers joining us along the way.

I am blessed, but some might say cursed, to have so many thoughts in my head when it comes to politics and social justice. I feel better educated for the 18 months I have been creating and sharing long-form content here, but more than that, I feel a sense of connection to those who generously give of their time to read and engage with what I do.

Those who know me will tell you I constantly strive to become better at what I do and to find better ways to communicate my thoughts. I know this platform has changed significantly since I’ve been here, as more people find their writing feet and more established journalists arrive on these shores. As I have stated previously, this has become my happy place, somewhere I’ve found a new sense of purpose, but above all it’s given me a voice to express my thoughts and fears.

In my piece earlier in the week:

I spoke of my plans to finally get a long-held ambition off the ground: delivering what I call the Truth Portal. If you are unfamiliar, you can read the piece above to understand my plans. Over the past few weeks, I’ve been fine-tuning an action plan to finally get it over the line, and while there are never any guarantees with this type of project, I have now finally gathered together all the pieces to deliver a proof-of-concept example to show exactly how I envision a more dynamic way of presenting critical information to support good decision-making when it comes to political engagement and voting.

One thing I am known for is telling it like it is, without fear or favour. As an outsider looking in, I believe I can bring objectivity that may be missing for those buried in the chaos this regime has created. If it’s one thing I’ve learned over the last 10 months trying to give birth to my idea, technology is moving at an astronomical pace. But that pace has also brought with it dynamic opportunities at a manageable cost.

As I previously mentioned, I will NOT be writing my usual daily pieces next week as I work on the first interactive article. It will be a hybrid version of my usual Substack, but with dynamic content that lets you navigate the piece based on how inquisitive you are about the different thoughts I share. It brings together smart technology that combines reading and visual content, along with other cool features that, if you choose to use them, offer a very different experience from a static read.

That said, those who prefer to read the normal article will see no change. I’m blessed to have the technical and visual design experience to do this myself during this proof-of-concept phase. This massively reduces cost, with the only trade-off being sleep; I won’t be getting much of that for sure. I’ve already invested in expanding my video production facilities and integrated the relevant industry-standard production software into the production pipeline. As a musician and former producer, I can also create and edit music and audio, so this will be a chance to bring all my skill sets together in one project, which is very exciting.

When you finally get to test-drive my idea shortly, paid subscribers and small-dollar supporters who have bought me a drink, so to speak, over the months will have a chance to see what their subscriptions and donations have helped create. I’m convinced you will be proud of what your investment has helped deliver. I had an amazing meeting this morning with the technology platform provider that will deliver the interactive elements, and I go into this weekend feeling nervous but very excited about what I hope will emerge, as I bring together a whole suite of technologies.

In a world of short attention spans and the imperative for instant gratification, I believe writers and commentators in the political space have to become more creative to reach a wider audience, which has never been as important as it is in this moment. The great thing about this project is that there is no profit objective. It’s not designed to be a cash cow. It’s simply about sharing the facts and the unvarnished truth using cutting-edge technology to deliver it. Every paid subscription and small dollar donation will be reinvested into the project, as has been the case to date. I’ve already funded the production facility and media licensing costs, so Substack revenue can help fund the new technology elements and cover hosting costs for the interactive platform.

I want to offer readers of my work a chance to join me on this exciting journey. I want to know what you think as I slowly roll out this initial proof of concept, because I want to better understand what works and what doesn’t. What’s effective and what’s not. Don’t get me wrong, I’m driving the bus, and I don’t intend to fall into the trap of design by committee; therein lies the road to failure, and we are not going there. It’s about me being able to listen to the thoughts of those who use it.

Let me take a moment to say: if you simply want to keep reading my Substack pieces, NOTHING will change. I will continue to produce the current volume of content, and you are under no obligation to interact with any media branches that extend beyond the piece. The technology extensions are completely optional, and the content will, as always, remain FREE for ALL Truth Matters readers. This is about extending reach, not limiting it. NOBODY should ever have to pay for the truth. It will bring with it shiny new branding and the long-promised podcast. The aim is to extend the brand across social media, with Substack being the headquarters.

It’s all about reimagining the delivery of my work and expanding reach, not for profit, but for the greater good. Old-fashioned, though that may sound in this upside-down world, I’m not here for the money; I want to use any success to provide opportunities for, amongst others, the many talented writers who don’t have the opportunity for their voice to be heard, not to mention the talented creators out there. Any writers featured will get full attribution, and their work will be directly linked to their Substack for subscription and revenue purposes; I’m not in this to take a cut; I’m simply here to deliver the truth. That’s it, that’s the aim. Anything else is gravy.

I want to be very clear: this is a totally experimental project, and there are no guarantees of success. However, I can promise an open door for questions and hands-on experience to assess its viability for yourself. Once I have the first article ready to drop, I’ll do a Substack live to open the floor for a Q&A and give a sneak preview of what's coming. This initial phase will be purely a working proof-of-concept model. The next phase would be to scale it, and that will require funding. At this point, the game changes. I believe the only way it could work is to crowdfund the scaling, because the big danger is that an investor comes along and it becomes vulnerable to outside agendas. Anyway, that’s way downstream and first steps first.

In an ideal world, everything would go to plan, though experience has taught me there is no guarantee. I believe I could deliver a basic scaled model of the technology by the time the next Congress is seated, allowing it to operate for a full election cycle.

In my opinion, the key to success is data. I want the platform to deliver tools that seamlessly integrate with my newsletter, while also allowing voters to assess how well their elected representative represents their interests. A wealth of publicly available data can cross-reference voting records with corporate donations and stated policy positions. A constituent should be able to select a policy and see a simple traffic-light ranking showing where they land on supporting corporate interests. Given this, data in the register of interests and voting record data is open source; once the data pipeline is established, it requires little maintenance.

There’s no reason a digital dashboard can’t be created to effectively deliver a real-time representation health check of any federally elected representative, either as a whole or in specific policy areas. Of course, these are downstream options, but it would not take long to establish the data pipelines to deliver such a dashboard, and I have already done the provisional groundwork.

These are indeed challenging times, and if we are to fight the tyranny currently blighting our lives, we have to take a collective approach, and I believe this is a first step in an effort that could deliver. How about we take this journey together and just see what happens?

My work begins this evening, and I won’t be writing my daily pieces next week while I get the foundational blocks in place, so I hope you will bear with me. I'll post notes as usual, but I won’t have time to write articles. Normal service on that front will resume on Monday, September 28th. If time allows, however, I may provide short updates as the week progresses.

I’ll drop another important, unrelated post in a couple of hours, which will effectively be my piece for today, and I’m going to try hard to drop the final piece of my series on the Palestinian Question late tomorrow evening or possibly Sunday, depending on how tomorrow goes.

There’s lots of work to be done in the week ahead, but it’s one of those jobs that is a pleasure, not a chore. Sleep will be the enemy of progress as it always is; I’ve been on this journey many times with software development.

Thank you for taking the time to read my proposition. As they always say, the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and that’s on me to deliver.

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