My master plan to create a modern media empire

A network of media organizations that support readers, not advertisers.

First, some news: I was recently awarded an O’Shaughnessy grant!

This is a dream come true. I have applied for their grants two years in a row, and finally was awarded one this year to develop a better media ecosystem.

As part of the process, I’m taking part in a year-long mentorship program complete with monthly goal tracking and weekly accountability. In the first session of our first month, they shared Elon Musk’s masterplan for Tesla, written in 2006:

Tesla’s master plan for creating a >$700B company

1. Build a sports car

2. Use that money to build an affordable car

3. Use that money to build an even more affordable car

4. While doing above, also provide zero-emission electric power generation options

I love the simplicity of this plan, and decided to create a similar one for my own business:

My master plan for creating a modern media empire

1. Build a media collective

2. Use the money from that collective to incubate media projects

   1. Ex. A better news media, a better book publisher, a better film studio, a better social media platform

3. Together, the media projects in our ecosystem will optimize for the best benefit of our primary stakeholders: Readers (and media consumers)

4. Through the above, we will change our media ecosystem from one of division and outrage to one of unity and productivity

Imagine how our world would change if The New York Times focused on coming up with solutions rather than reporting on every possible problem? Imagine if Penguin published books with a positive outlook on the future, instead of the dystopian ones available to us today. Imagine if film studios, like Hello Sunshine, turned those books into sci-fi series that imagined futures we want to build, instead of the ones we want to avoid? Imagine if social media systems like Twitter fostered social cohesion, instead of division?

A transformed media landscape would create a transformed cultural landscape. Even a transformed world.

How do we go about creating this?

One of the questions that really struck me during the O’Shaughnessy program: If this is my 10-year plan, how can I accomplish it in six months? For a while, I had it in my head that we need to recreate every one of the media organizations currently in existence—but that immovability is the problem with our current media system, not the solution. The truth is we already have the tools to incubate each of these media projects right now:

• A better news media → start a news Substack (coming soon!)

• A better book publisher? → expand what we’re doing with print pamphlets and books! (on it!)

• A better film studio? → let’s create a sci-fi video series for Substack (I’m currently looking for a video partner!)

• A better social media platform? → let’s build it for our community! (We can do better than Slack!)

This will require funding—the kind that benefits readers

Now, imagine that we transform how we fund media as we go. I recently crowdfunded a book and gave ownership to the readers, rather than to a publishing house. Could we do something similar for every media project going forward? Perhaps we could ask readers to fund various media projects—small pamphlets like CITY STATE and TERRAFORM as well as larger projects like podcasts, books, and newsletters—and only bill them if we earn enough to move forward with the project. We could use the money crowdfunded from readers to pay writers and designers, and print pamphlets and books for everyone who contributed.

I’m going to do some experimentation here, but we might eventually need to create custom funding platform to accomplish this. No matter what, we’ll need to bump up our revenue to accomplish everything listed above. That’s why I’m using some of the funds from my grant to hire Austin Volz, who will be responsible for business development and growing a new program for funding partners. We’ve structured this program in the vein of old social clubs, where readers pay subscriptions, but patrons support the running of our business. If you are interested in supporting our media projects while joining our advisory council, co-designing upcoming media projects with us, participating as writers or guest lecturers for our readers, and attending exclusive and private events, you can reach out to Austin at austin@elysian.press. Click here to learn more!

I’ve learned a lot from creative experiments already. My hope is that our continued experiments in publishing will allow us to create and fund media projects that serve readers, one project at a time, rather than media projects that serve advertisers, benefit corporate and political interests, keep us glued to our phones in fear, and send us into doom spirals in the process.

I’m interested in creating a better media ecosystem, one that changes our culture for the better.

Thanks for being here and thinking it through with me as we go,

Elle Griffin