Top all-time · #1002
Ted Gioia
Personal blog · tedgioia.substack.comculturewriting
Ted Gioia writes The Honest Broker, a personal blog at tedgioia.substack.com about culture and writing. Since 2021, 69 different Hacker News readers have linked it 147 times, most often “How I Became the Honest Broker”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-10-31, and you can follow it by feed.
A trustworthy guide to music, books, arts, media & culture by Ted Gioia. Click to read The Honest Broker, a Substack publication with hundreds of thousands of subscribers.
Most-linked posts?
- How I Became the Honest Broker9 people · 14 mentions · first linked 2021-05-27
- The State of the Culture (2023)5 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2023-02-09
- Has the Internet Reached Peak Clickability?4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2022-10-15
- Where did the long tail go?3 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2022-06-21
- A society without a counterculture?3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2022-05-28
- My Lifetime Reading Plan3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2023-04-29
- In 1970, Alvin Toffler Predicted the Rise of Future Shock–But Opposite Happened3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2023-05-28
- The Decline and Fall of the Hit Instrumental Song3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2023-04-09
- New numbers on music consumption2 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2022-07-15
- What Can We Learn from Barnes and Noble's Surprising Turnaround?2 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2022-12-28
What Hacker News says?
How I became the honest broker. https://tedgioia.substack.com/p/how-i-became-the-honest-brok...
Comment linking /p/how-i-became-the-honest-broker
on “Ask HN: What's the most life-changing blog post you've ever read?”Submitted Record labels dig their own grave, and the shovel is called TikTok as a story · 292 points
HN discussionGhost[0] Seems like it more or less fits what you're describing. I first heard about it on an episode of Indie Hackers.[1] It was an especially interesting and unusual episode. I remember him talking about positioning with open source and also him going on these crazy international sailing trips while running the company. Also I can't comment on a post about substack without mentioning my favorite substack post of a…
Comment linking /p/how-i-became-the-honest-broker?s=r
on “We’re the founders of Substack, we just launched an iOS app. AUA”Submitted Where did the long tail go? as a story · 281 points
HN discussion> I will be developing a blog for SEO purposes Your blog will suck and it won't sell. People are getting really tired of this. I'll stray from the usual advice and recommend what worked for me: brutal, disinterested honesty. People are weary of hucksters, and will sign blank cheques to the guy who offers straightforward, unbiased advice. I've had enough of sales early on, and chose to be a honest broker. This guy wr…
Comment linking /p/how-i-became-the-honest-broker
on “Ask HN: How to learn to sell?”Submitted You Don't Need a Mentor–Find a Nemesis Instead as a story · 196 points
HN discussionhaha that's definitely a big component of it all. But the engaged clickable web is anyways dead. This post is a static HTML file hosted on IPFS with no back links to my carefully curated blog and media presence. No branding. It's because I've accepted that people's bullshit-radar is sensitive towards overly optimized engagement content. Rather I want my text to be read and those that care will anyways online-search…
Comment linking /p/has-the-internet-reached-peak-clickability
on “We should have Markdown-rendered websites”Submitted Books That Changed How I Hear Music as a story · 167 points
HN discussionHave you heard of Hermeto Pascoal? I started listening to him the other day based on this article... https://tedgioia.substack.com/p/the-most-musical-man-in-the-... He's pretty incredible!
Comment linking /p/the-most-musical-man-in-the-world
on “Ask HN: What Are You Learning?”Submitted New numbers on music consumption as a story · 164 points
HN discussion>And there are no longer pronounced subcultures either This article is an elaboration on an earlier post by the author about there being no countercultures in today's world: "14 Warning Signs That You Are Living in a Society Without a Counterculture" https://tedgioia.substack.com/p/14-warning-signs-that-you-ar...
Comment linking /p/14-warning-signs-that-you-are-living
on “New numbers on music consumption”Submitted If AT&T Had Managed the Phone Business Like Google as a story · 159 points
HN discussionhttps://tedgioia.substack.com/p/how-i-became-the-honest-brok... - Someone put into words my business strategy https://www.kalzumeus.com/2011/10/28/dont-call-yourself-a-pr... - Essential advice for anyone starting their career
Comment linking /p/how-i-became-the-honest-broker
on “Ask HN: What are some blog posts that you have enjoyed going through?”Submitted The fake artists problem on streaming platforms as a story · 154 points
HN discussionI started at home, using guides on the internet. My first project was Random Facts for Palm OS. However I made my first real money building websites for small businesses. This is where I learned what customers actually value. It also taught me how valuable an honest broker [0] is. Honesty is a powerful sales pitch. Trust signs blank cheques. I then spent a few years as a professional web developer, making not-so-mea…
Comment linking /p/how-i-became-the-honest-broker?s=r
on “Ask HN: HN people who write meaningful software, how did you learn to program?”- b5 · 2022-07-27
Submitted A prominent composer lost his Wikipedia page as a story · 148 points
HN discussion Definitely not! If you act like a jerk it's not like that goes unnoticed either. Wouldn't you rather do business with companies that seem like they're generally trying to be helpful? Stripe is a good example. YC is a good example. Frankly there is a shortage of companies like this, thats part of why you may feel this way. This shortage makes it more valuable to operate with integrity. Also it's just a much more fun…
Comment linking /p/how-i-became-the-honest-broker
on “Why do I feel like you need to be a sociopath to succeed?”Submitted Is old music killing new music? as a story · 148 points
HN discussionThere's No Speed Limit [0] How I Became The Honest Broker [1] Running with Bruce Lee [2] This excerpt from Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman [3] Before The Startup [4] (also available in video form[5]) [0] https://sive.rs/kimo [1] https://tedgioia.substack.com/p/how-i-became-the-honest-brok... [2] http://quittingadderall.com/running-with-bruce-lee-quote/ [3] https://www.asc.ohio-state.edu/kilcup.1/262/feynman.html [4…
Comment linking /p/how-i-became-the-honest-broker
on “Ask HN: What are your favorite Essays/Longform blogposts”Submitted How to commit murder inside a locked room as a story · 146 points
HN discussionI feel that the original Gioia article may be more interesting: https://tedgioia.substack.com/p/14-warning-signs-that-you-ar...
Comment linking /p/14-warning-signs-that-you-are-living
on “Do We Live in a Society Without a Counterculture?”Submitted A doctor who treated Bach and Handel with disastrous results as a story · 134 points
HN discussionWe may have reached peak content with a shrinking audience. See https://tedgioia.substack.com/p/the-state-of-the-culture-202...
Comment linking /p/the-state-of-the-culture-2023
on “Hundreds of changes made to latest editions of Roald Dahl's books”Submitted How Did Elevators Lose Their Music? as a story · 118 points
HN discussionI'm not sure how this addresses the fundamental problem, which is that Spotify pays a very low price per stream, so you have to be a huge star to make any money, and Spotify is taking a large part of the proceeds in the meantime. Also there's the secondary problem that Spotify has an incentive to produce easy-to-digest content in house for which it pays lower (or no) royalties [0]. For you, the equivalent of problem…
Comment linking /p/the-fake-artists-problem-is-much
on “Launch HN: MagnaPlay (YC W23) – Indie gaming subscription service for PC”Submitted Observations on tragedy in a digital age as a story · 102 points
HN discussionDo not upvote this. Find the original Ted Gioia piece and submit that (if it hasn't already been submitted, which I think it has). Just look in his channel on Substack. Or better yet, read his essay after this one on how this trend is already ending: https://tedgioia.substack.com/p/the-buying-mania-for-old-son...
Comment linking /p/the-buying-mania-for-old-songs-has
on “Is Old Music Killing New Music?”Submitted Why do they burn a man at Burning Man? as a story · 97 points
HN discussionThese are some of my favorites: https://sive.rs/kimo http://quittingadderall.com/running-with-bruce-lee-quote/ (this one is cheesy but I still enjoy it) https://tedgioia.substack.com/p/how-i-became-the-honest-brok...
Comment linking /p/how-i-became-the-honest-broker
on “Ask HN: What are some of the most interesting articles that you've read?”Submitted I write a parenting advice column (or how I became famous in my neighborhood) as a story · 87 points
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