In the end, death comes to every trend.
Welcome fellow techno-cynics! Trend Mill is a sometimes insightful, always sassy newsletter that looks at the latest trends in business and tech with a critical/skeptical eye.
What is Trend Mill?
Trend Mil began as an actual paid (!) column I had for Medium’s business publication Marker (shout out to my then-editor, Jean-Luc Bouchard, who came up with the catchy column name. It’s a play on a treadmill, which, you know, keeps on going round, much like business and tech trends.) I only got a few entries into the project before it ended with Medium’s editorial pivot, leaving my dreams in tatters.
For a while, it sat dormant. Now, it has been resurrected on this platform, and it’s here to stay. Trend Mill is a sometimes insightful, always sassy newsletter that looks at the latest trends in business and tech with a critical eye. And, as the feature image suggests, one by one, we’ll watch them come and go. It features a healthy dose of dunking on Big Tech, the Metaverse, NFTs, crypto, A.I. and whatever the “next big thing” is.
As we hurtle towards a dystopian Metaverse hellscape future without thought for the consequences, led by megalomaniac tech overlords who care about nothing but their ego, power and share price — why not subscribe and share in the fun (read: misery) with me.
Question: Who the hell are you?
When offering me advice for succeeding on Substack, someone told me, "Don't be seen as <random internet worker>."
Fair point.
If you're going to get me in your inbox every week, you should know a little bit more about me. So, let's clear that up. I'm Stephen Moore. I'm a writer (duh) and editor. Yes, it's very conventional stuff so far.
But I didn't take the conventional route to get here.
I might seem put together, but my CV was a mess for most of my adult life. I graduated from university with a degree in Product Design that I’ve never used. I've been an on-again, off-again hospitality worker longer than I'd like to admit. Hotels, restaurants, kitchens, bars, theaters – you name it, I've worked it. I eventually plucked up the courage to start my own business that was somewhat related to my degree – a small, two-person bespoke shopfitting company called Roots Furniture – which did okay for several years. Then, the pandemic hit and shut down the entire industry we worked within.
It left my life at a crossroads.
At that point, I was a hobbyist-writer, writing to berate how unrealistic the consensus and advice around startups was. My take? It was pretty shitty for the most part. So when I found myself quarantined in my home, unable to travel to work, access our workshop, or work with clients, I was already teetering on the edge of making a change. I took the plunge. I walked away from the business to pursue becoming a full-time writer.
As words became more of my day-to-day life, I quickly realized being a hobbyist-writer is another way of saying "being broke as shit."
So, I started searching for opportunities to earn and build my reputation. I caught my first lucky break when somebody I admired on Medium reached out to me with a job opportunity. Before I knew it, I was Editor-In-Chief of the Post-Grad Survival Guide, a publication helping post-grads navigate the throws of life. After a few years of that, I ended up working at Medium itself, a real proud moment for me, alongside some actual journalists who did so much to help me progress. As an Editor and Creator Consultant, I ran the in-house publications focused on work, business and tech. It was at this moment I fell in love with the idea of writing about these subjects. After almost a year, Medium decided to blow that up and laid off the entire editorial team, closing the publications soon after that. It was my first sort-of-redundancy in the cutthroat world of writing. I'll admit I've had a couple more since.
It's been a bit of a roller coaster. Since I started hobbyist-level writing in late 2016, I've,
built an audience of over 60,000 on Medium,
grown a base of over 4,000 subscribers here,
earned thousands of $$$ from my words,
edited the books of thought leaders,
ghostwritten articles for CEOs,
edited for publications
Ran a content team at a marketing agency.
But throughout the ride, I've honed my craft. I've done the hard yards to get my work to the level it is today. I'm not a tech or business insider, and don't try to be. What I am is someone filled with passion for sharing words. I have strong opinions, and an ever-growing sense of dread as to what the future holds.
