Instead of optimising for immediate visibility, you always have the opportunity and option to create for a future audience. One that’s somewhere in the long tail. If you’re willing to embrace that, you don’t need to worry about algorithms or trends.
Full Show Notes: https://thejaymo.net/2024/10/20/2427-when-is-the-audience/
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Permanently moved is a personal podcast 301 seconds in length, written and recorded by @thejaymo
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When Is The Audience?
A listener recently asked me a really good question: “When is your audience for this?”
It’s not something most creators ask themselves, especially if caught up in the grind of a regular creative practice online. What dominates is a different question entirely: “What am I making next?”
Whilst grinding under algorithmic pressure, it’s easy to fall into the trap of chasing the now. Whether it’s jumping on the latest trend, reacting to the news cycle, the focus is almost always immediate. What to make this week, how to get more views this month, or boost downloads this year.
This focus on “nowness” isn’t new. But with social platforms the pressure to be relevant inside the algorithm has grown and the window of time narrowed. People are constantly advised to monitor trends, follow the formula, and chase the meme of the week.
But what if you stop making work for the right now?
Bruce Sterling’s 2010 Transmediale speech on Atemporality for the Creative Artist. Has influenced everything I’ve done online since: my blog, this podcast, my involvement in Solarpunk etc.
In our networked world, the boundaries between past, present, and future have collapsed. Artists can now operate in an atemporal space—where work can be discovered, reused, and repurposed at any time. Instead of creating in a way because algorithms demand it, I create for a future atemporal audience—for people who might find my work at any time.
We’re currently living in the “post-social” era. Social media is collapsing, and creators are being forced to find new ways of connecting with an audience. If that’s you, I encourage you to think beyond the platforms immediate demands. Focus instead on how your work can be discovered on its own terms, in its own time.
When you embrace atemporality, the question “When is the audience?” becomes liberating. The answer is simple: You don’t know. You’re no longer tied to hitting metrics or chasing trends. You’re free to create for an audience that will might not find you for months—or even years.
Of course, this approach requires playing a very long game. When I started blogging again back in 2018, I had no goals—only the idea I wanted to build something on my own domain. At the time, I figured it would take about five years for something meaningful to emerge. And six years later, that’s exactly what has happened. Not because I optimised for visibility, but because I gave the thing I was doing time and space to develop.
The same philosophy guided this podcast. I knew it would take about three years before it became substantial. Worthwhile—and that’s what happened. Now, it is true that many people think doing something week after week without gaining an immediate huge following is madness. Which is why most podcasts don’t survive past episode three. But I honestly belive you have to play a different game.
A perfect example is last year’s episode of 301 about Don Quixote. Initially, it reached my regular audience, but over time, it became the most successful episode of the year. The audience wasn’t immediate—it was waiting somewhere out in the future. Similarly, episodes from two or three years ago will find new relevance as cultural contexts shift. The audience wasn’t present at release; they were further down the timeline.
This is why atemporal thinking is crucial in today’s fractured media landscape. Instead of optimising for immediate visibility, you always have the opportunity to create for a future audience. One that’s somewhere in the long tail. If you’re willing to embrace that, you don’t need to worry about algorithms or trends.
But let’s be honest: it’s not easy. Creating for a future audience means working without immediate feedback or recognition. You have to be okay with the fact that, for a long time, almost no one will be listening, reading, or watching. I still remember when this show first hit 30 downloads in its week. I was thrilled. It wasn’t much, but I kept going, knowing an audience would come later.
These days, 301 hovers around bottom of top 100 charts on Apple for its category. It’s validating, sure, but those numbers don’t define me or the show. I look back and realise however that all those episodes I made with virtually no one listening, were made for people like you, the people who are watching and listening right now. And they are still all there for people to discover in the future.
My zine, Start Select Reset, on the other hand is a long-term project. Something I hope will grow into its audience over the next decade. I’m two and a half years in and I accept I’m playing the long game with it. The print run grows with every issue and I think that my subscribers enjoy receiving it. Issue 11 just went out last week by the way. I have about six issues left. If you’d like one too, you can support the show at thejaymo.net/zine.
My zine is the only creative work I make for the now—something that reaches it’s audience and then it’s done. Everything else is made for online. With the knowledge that its audience might not arrive until much later. But that doesn’t make the work any less valuable—it might make it more so, in fact.
Creating for a future audience means investing in something bigger than the present moment. The work of the body creates the body of work; part of a conversation that might unfold in a time I can’t fully see.
It’s a long game but I enjoy playing it.
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