Inside Substack’s $650M Playbook for the Future of Media (Chris Best & Hamish McKenzie, Co-Founders)

In a world where attention is fragmented and algorithms rule the content landscape, Chris Best and Hamish McKenzie are taking a radically different approach with Substack. Rather than chasing clicks, Substack focuses on a simple yet powerful idea: creators should own their work and make money directly from their audience through paid subscriptions. With over 5 million paid subscriptions and tens of millions of active readers, Substack has turned this model into a transformative force in media.In this episode, Chris and Hamish unpack how they’re reshaping creator economics, navigating AI’s role in creativity, and enabling a new era for writers, from serialized fiction to short-form video.