Last month my phone was snatched out of my hands outside Holborn tube station. Yes, I was texting. I was returning from a leaving party at the publisher I myself left 26 years ago, and I was messaging my friend Alex in Pittsburgh – something about writing, in fact – and then my phone was whipped away by a thief on an e-bike. There – then gone. So smooth, so quick, and most disorientating.

This story does have a happy ending, but before that eventuality came about I was telling myself this theft was a sign. There’s always a lesson. It was the cosmos seizing distraction right from in front of my face. I know I spend too much time on my phone, and I know I should reduce my digital habits for something with greater purpose and clarity, even if it’s just reading a library book. And although the real moral of the tale is that someone else should not have been thieving, I should not have been texting on the street.

I use so many platforms – some for specific purposes, some for reasons yet to be known. I use MailChimp, I use Substack, and I use WordPress for this blog, which my EVP of operations, communication and puns slash husband is helping me make over. To be unveiled in January.

I use Instagram times two, one personal and one for work, and it’s a fave – laffs and dogs and garden porn. I mean, what beats Sylvanian Drama? This year gay memes probably provided more entertainment than most of the high-concept novels I read, and even better are the salty comments. I do feel guilty spending far too much time screwing around on social media, but let’s tell ourselves I’ve been indoctrinated by productivity culture – a sentiment I found in one of my leftie follows, of course.

I have not used Facebook since 2016, and I stopped using Twitter this year, both of them (1) because of politics and (2) because people I know and really like in person magicked themselves into whiners or showoffs. Or maybe it was because I didn’t need to be told how brilliant Succession and The White Lotus were, because they weren’t. Some mean-spirited and scornful people have started to use Instagram like Twitter, and I’ve unfollowed, removed and blocked them. Tedious. I don’t use TikTok, mostly because I’m determined not to allow another distraction in front of my face. Maybe I’m stronger than I think.

I now use Bluesky and I now use Threads, though the evangelism can be a bit much, and there’s already plenty of that performative whining and showing off in both places. I’m already dreading reactions to the third season of The White Lotus. I should be patient and more forgiving, but too often the attention-seeking draws my attention to the innate loneliness and alienation of the modern condition, and that makes me feel a bit sad. Plus I don’t think I’m pithy or witty enough for the cool hot takes these short forms seem to demand. Plus: more noise.

I use email, though maybe not as much as when I corresponded with friends on other continents in epic missives at the dawn of a new millennium.

I now also use another email for work, and to send Zoom invitations.

I use iMessage, mostly with family, and I use WhatsApp, where I gossip and laugh and am very rude in private and hope that one day our messages will never be sequestered and read like those in the Blake Lively court case (delete delete delete). Some of my best times are had on WhatsApp. Sometimes I also use it for spontaneous video calls, and those hours fly by.

Substack. Back to Substack. I’ve been using Substack this year. I have enjoyed reading many writers there, and I’m often discovering new ones. I particularly enjoyed George Saunders introducing thousands of new readers in his Story Club to Bobbie Louise Hawkins through her story The Child. That’s very powerful literary outreach. There are a lot of committed readers on Substack.

But there’s a LOT of content, a lot of it overlapping, and a lot of keeping up. A lot of noise, and that’s before my part in it. What’s left for me to say?

And a lot of those lots of people on Substack seem to be talking to themselves or about themselves, and doing a lot of it. I’m good at both of these things already, and do I need to do more?

And also: what is Substack? How should I join in? I had thought about Substack as a platform for teaching, and never say never but right now I’m not sure. And how do I even use Substack? Lots of knobs and dials. Newsletters. Posts. Notes. There are things I go to use, and every time I can’t find them. Someone could explain all of this to me but as it’s not coming intuitively I think there is a problem. Maybe it’s because it all looks and sounds the same and gets whirled into a big blur of words and ego.

As a reader maybe I’d like Substack more if it were user-friendly, and I could select a handful to receive as email, but right now it’s all or nothing, so all email is turned off. It’s clunky. Plus I still have my New Yorker subscription, and those New Yorker editors edit (Substackers: take note, and this includes myself too).

Someone recently compared Substack to LinkedIn, and I can’t unthink that. Some of those professional Substackers really are too much – a lot of coaches coaching, a lot of tech bros broing, a lot of grifters grifting. Should I become one too? And then there’s the smattering of cranks and white nationalists that have been shoved in my feed. I’m sure they think their arguments are clever and well proportioned, but No. Brandon Taylor recently described how Notes made him peevish. I know the feeling.

I once had hopes for finding community on Substack, but so far nearly all of my engagement has been with people I know, and there’s not as much reciprocation or sharing as I expected. Maybe it’s the algorithm. Maybe I need to spend more time there or make more effort or grift more. I enjoyed sharing some of my old stories on Substack this summer, but the people who read them seem to have been these people I know already. Some of them even emailed me about them! I hadn’t realised how much I’d enjoy fan mail. I have an ego too.

I don’t currently pay for any Substack subscriptions. I sometimes feel guilty about that, but then I support writers in plenty other ways. And I do have that New Yorker subscription and my library card.

I use LinkedIn too – let’s forget that. Though I do forget it and usually only remember when someone’s account pops up in Google search results.

And then I use Mailchimp, mostly to promote new classes, because I do grift too, though I try not to hustle too hard and I usually also share what I’m reading (The Great When by Alan Moore) or watching (Somebody, Somewhere and Girls).

I also use Linktree, which is especially useful now we can organise our posts under headings.

And I use Zoom, where I meet for classes and mentoring and talk to writers about their works-in-progress. In many ways that is the best platform of all.

It’s a lot, isn’t it. And we all know that each of these platforms will have its day. They’ll get bought by some corporation or some vandal, or something will wane, and then we’ll all move again. Impermanence is very real on the digital landscape. This does make the ability to return to my own site more attractive. Writer Ellis Eden recently commented on a post here: ‘Sometimes it’s lovely not to wade into substack, medium, etc, to read away from the boiling pot.’

For now I too am writing about writing, and a whining tone is creeping in. But at least I’m not doing it on Substack, unless I decide to copy this there too. Though complaining about Substack is a subgenre on Substack, and sometimes we do have to follow the market.

Plus I recently developed tinnitus. Which may or may not have an obvious cause, but is yet another ringing in my ear. All this noise, and here I am adding to it.

However: there are serious points here – about which platforms to use on social media as both creator and observer/participant, about where to spend my/your time and energy. And for what reason? Is it just for the Likes? To be seen, to be read. Yes – that is some of it, though too I know my reach isn’t wide. I’m not wily enough for a social media strategy, and I probably rattle on too much for most readers of blogs or Substack.

Like. Monetise. Commodify. Grift. I realise I’m not very entrepreneurial either. I worry that if I send too many Mailchimps, people might unsubscribe, but I realised I don’t want my mailing list cluttered with people who don’t want to be there, so feel free to go. Someone I know unsubscribed from my very first Mailchimp within five minutes of it being mailed out, and I don’t think they know that I know, but I do. I did feel hurt by this at the time, but I decided it’s a sign of their character and not mine, and I have plenty of other generous mates online and off. It’s best to stop chasing the Likes, and let them come to me. Another lesson.

I do miss community, such as gathering in person for the monthly salons of Kellie Jackson’s Words Away or for classes in physical classrooms. Online I think a problem lies in the fact that there are so many communities plural, and we spread ourselves thinly, so everything feels atomised. (Also: the showing off, and the peevishness.)

Write it down! says my pal Elaine. Writing all this down helps me understand that my most rewarding platforms are Instagram, Zoom, and my blog. I should probably ration my time consuming the memes and the clips from Golden Girls, but these are the places where I probably express my true self or maybe I should say one of my best selves. Maybe the online self I’m happiest with and the online self I have most fun with.

My SVP of puns, who in tidying up my site has gone back more than a decade to my very first posts, tells me my own voice is most authentic here on my blog, and it’s true: I feel my voice here more than anywhere else. I’m all about voice in writing, and when we feel our voices we’re feeling something essential about ourselves.

I might use Substack for monthly craft posts, as there does seem to be serious dialogue on such topics there, but do I need to get some Substack guide to tell me how to optimise my footprint, to monetise, commodify, etc.? As I often say to another pal on WhatsApp, it’s a LOT. For now, I’ll just post it there and see what happens.

And there are also notebooks and yellow pads. And then there’s writing letters and postcards. By hand. I do have lovely handwriting, and nothing really beats the erotics of putting pen to paper and ink on the page. I write letters to friends, and some of them like Angela and Bhanu send me epics in reply, often composed on Basildon Bond or the back of water bills and over the course of many months before finally getting popped in the post with a stamp showing a beaver or a whippet.

All our electronic communications do scatter the attention. When I started working in publishing, we were still using the typewriter and the fax – and the telex! A few years in we got a computer in each department, and then one on every desk.

My chum Nann the rights director always told us editors to ‘get electronic rights’ when bidding for books. We had no idea what electronic rights were back then. For a while they were CD-ROM’s, but then that hard-shelled moment passed. We had no idea what was coming. Just as we have no idea what AI will mean or what else is coming down the road to reshape or enlighten or fray our attentions.

So for now I’m just looking forward to making changes to my site – a refresh and some housekeeping and reorganising. Also booking links for the 2025 round of masterclasses and workshops, because I have to commodify myself too and especially because I love teaching. Beginnings is on 13 January at 7pm.

I could ask what you use, what you prefer – genuine curiosity, genuine engagement – and some of you could reply in comments below. I don’t like, however, how even that starts to feel like a hustle or a cry for attention, and now I’m asking if writing and blogging are just self-indulgence.

But maybe all writing is ultimately for the self. I loved this on post from Heather Havrilesky on Substack earlier today: ‘I Published A Novel And No One Cares’.

That happy ending: I got my phone back! I was one of the lucky ones. The thief was nicked minutes after my phone was snatched. He had numerous other phones in his possession – along with a machete, apparently. I found this out later in the Daily Mail.

The following afternoon in a West End police station was an education. The police btw were GREAT. Many dedicated public servants are doing a good job with scant resources. Defunding the police sounds like a great idea in a world without crime, but until that happy day justice needs its advocates and practitioners and also its enforcers. (And let’s not forget the white-collar and political thugs and criminals too.)

Meanwhile: I am a teacher, and there are lessons in the story of my phone snatch. For a start, carry emergency phone numbers in places other than your phone. Also: record somewhere safe the 15-digit IMEI model number of your phone, set up security, have backup in the Cloud, know how to deactivate your phone, and know how to use Find My Phone.

And also: don’t use your phone. Like, really. They are handy devices, but they don’t own us. Maybe it’s time we mostly returned to our desks to write and work and communicate. To the library, and to the purest platform of the page.