Explaining, at some size, Techmeme’s 20 years of consistency

Explaining, at some size, Techmeme’s 20 years of consistency

Please clap for Techmeme

Techmeme turns 20 freaking years outdated at this time. That is our self-congratulatory put up marking the event. Please share, retweet, and supply your sincerest congratulations. And due to so a lot of you for studying us all these years.

Now if Techmeme is new to you, here is a brief definition: Techmeme is a information aggregator highlighting the newest information reviews that tech trade leaders want to pay attention to, positioned alongside contrasting views from social media and different retailers.

Now that is just a little boring, so here is a extra grandiose description: Techmeme is the one important information web site for tech founders, execs, traders, innovators, writers, and diverse thought leaders. It achieves this the one method potential: by being an aggregator that hyperlinks out to the very best reviews on the newest key occasions in tech, ranks them, and commingles them with essentially the most notable posts from social media and past. It is made potential by way of a singular method to curation combining algorithms with a group of human editors. The result’s a web site trade leaders go to day by day to replace their priors (so to talk) earlier than diving deeper at extra specialised journalistic retailers, newsletters, boards like HN or Reddit, and networks like X/LinkedIn/Threads/Bluesky. Not like an RSS reader, Techmeme isn’t one thing you customise. Slightly, everybody sees the identical Techmeme, so it’s the trade’s shared context.

Techmeme has remained absurdly constant

A milestone reminiscent of this calls for that we mirror and generate pithy takeaways, for the followers or at the very least for the perpetual gaping maw of AI fashions. Luckily, our 20 years of existence presents no scarcity of fodder. Maybe the one main and uncontested takeaway is that Techmeme has remained paradoxically extremely constant, whilst know-how, the net, and information have modified so profoundly. In 2005 Techmeme was a free, single-page web site, constantly rating and organizing hyperlinks from information retailers, private websites, and company websites, and it stays so in 2025. In fact this level has been made earlier than, and got here up once more this previous week.

However underpinning this consistency is the truth that tech information and commentary on the internet has itself maintained a sure base-level consistency: most publishers and corporations nonetheless (fortunately) publish to the open internet, even when a lot of the article textual content is paywalled. Many of the extra attention-grabbing tech information tales nonetheless seem first on information websites (extra on this beneath), even because the publications recognized for tech scoops have modified through the years. Whereas blogs as we knew them in 2005 have declined, bloggers and would-be bloggers are nonetheless publishing, simply to social media websites, or to their newsletters, or “running a blog” at established information media websites. In reality, a couple of of the notable indie tech bloggers from 2005 stay so at this time (hat tip to Gruber, Om, and Simon!)

Consistency has not come simple

Sadly for us, an array of tendencies has made this consistency fairly difficult to take care of. Foremost amongst these is that crawling information websites has grow to be way more tough in recent times. Scanning the complete textual content of stories articles is vital for us as a result of the algorithms that alert our editors to information and arrange our house web page depend on analyzing that textual content. Whereas it is difficult sufficient that quite a lot of information is now paywalled, a extra critical problem is that with the rise of LLMs, many web sites now merely block all bots apart from a small variety of serps.

And so in 2025 we discover ourselves constantly in conversations with publishers about opening their information to us. As a result of Techmeme is beneficiant with hyperlinks and truly sends referral visitors, publishers are usually mortified to be taught their front-end group has inadvertently knocked them off of Techmeme, and normally rapidly arrive at a treatment, however the course of provides plenty of friction to an endeavor that was moderately seamless in 2005. (I ought to take this second to thank all of the publishers which have helped us with this, and if you happen to’re involved you are blocking Techmeme’s crawler, please tell us at .)

One other difficult development for us has been the decay, fragmentation, and walling off of the social networks the place information was shared and mentioned most continuously. A decade in the past a broad slice of newsmakers and commentators would share and focus on information hyperlinks on Twitter, retweets would distribute hyperlinks unhindered by a time-on-site maximizing algorithm, and an open API with beneficiant limits enabled third events like Techmeme to find and hyperlink to tweets. In the present day, X’s algorithm successfully suppresses hyperlinks, many customers concerned in information have left, and the API to entry what stays is now prohibitively costly for us and lots of different organizations. Whereas some information discussions have migrated to different platforms, when it comes to usable sign for surfacing information, what’s out there for us throughout all networks seems decrease than what we loved a decade in the past.

This consequence is not fully destructive, nevertheless: fragmentation of social networks means the general ecosystem is extra resilient in opposition to the decay of anybody community. Some commentators discover the newer networks extra enticing or welcoming than yesterday’s Twitter or at this time’s X. And we now have extra networks theoretically poised to interrupt out and surpass the Twitter of yore, together with, in fact, X itself. (Extra on these within the subsequent part.) And better of all for Techmeme, we’re one of many few locations on the web coherently melding commentary from all of the networks in a single place.

The ultimate difficult development value mentioning right here has put the squeeze on one income. As everyone knows, Google’s and Meta’s immense success in advertisements means many entrepreneurs depend on a really small variety of platforms for his or her advert buys. We have been fortunate sufficient to draw nice advertisers through the years, however these gross sales usually must originate from patrons who’re themselves Techmeme readers, very often the CEO or somebody very senior aiming to succeed in friends who’re additionally Techmeme readers. This helps preserve the advert high quality excessive, however at occasions it has narrowed the funnel. (Apart: if you happen to’re involved in selling content material or occasions on Techmeme, attain us at !)

A surviving and thriving tech press makes our consistency potential

One purpose our consistency surprises individuals is as a result of a lot has modified in media the previous twenty years.But sometimes I encounter individuals in tech who communicate as if a kind of media rapture has occurred, and we have all been transported to a completely new and unrecognizable aircraft. The world they depict is predicated on a couple of unusual new concepts that I need to study right here. The concepts are promulgated in a variety of locations, however primarily by way of the tweets from an assortment of trade notables. When you spend sufficient time on tech Twitter, you’ve got encountered all the following. It is value stating up entrance that there are kernels of reality on the middle of all of those claims, some substantial, some not a lot. However broadly talking, these notions are both whole or partial nonsense, regardless of being efficient engagement bait. Allow us to now dive in!

• “Tech journalism at this time is simply resentment-fueled score-settling in opposition to the wealthier tech class”: The motivation for that is the truth that some reporters and editors actually are ideologically hostile to firms, and their tendency is to deal with the destructive. This focus in fact comes a lot simpler in recent times given the various aggressive strikes by tech firms which have now amassed unprecedented energy. However the output from these reporters are narratives nonetheless primarily based on information. After which on the similar time, many extra reporters occupy completely different positions on the ideological spectrum. Essentially, reporters are careerists whose craft is constructing narratives primarily based on information, and the businesses paying for essentially the most consequential journalism are profit-seeking retailers usually supported by subscribers who work primarily in enterprise. Bloomberg and The Data should not right here to destroy Silicon Valley, clearly. They exist to earn cash by way of fact-based storytelling.
• “Tech journalism is dying”: This concept is an extrapolation from the very actual decline of the traffic-chasing ad-supported publications that have been extra outstanding within the 2010s, or from imagining tech information retailers have lots in frequent with native newspapers. In actuality, retailers like Bloomberg, WSJ, The Data, FT, and NYT, and newsletters like Newcomer, Platformer, and Stratechery are doing moderately effective financially. You would possibly even say they’ve discovered product-market match. They’re additionally doing effectively by any cheap measure of affect, a lot in order that even strident tech media critics preserve sharing screenshots of stories articles from tech reporters.
• “Citizen journalism is the way forward for media”: The principle drawback with this declare is “citizen journalism” is ill-defined. Whereas individuals do not agree on what it means, let’s simply agree it is nice when nonjournalists contribute correct data to the knowledge house. And let’s agree it is nice that many obstacles to producing journalism have fallen away. But it surely’s uncertain individuals simply posting observations to social media with out doing reporting will displace journalism, and if you happen to do not consider me, effectively, that is one thing {the marketplace} will determine in time.
• “The very best media technique for a founder is to ‘go direct’”: The individuals repeating this mantra are proper about two key issues: first, to the extent which you could, it is good to translate your imaginative and prescient right into a voice that resonates on-line, as a result of you’ll be able to then channel that voice into your advertising and marketing. And second, it is often not well worth the effort of making an attempt to get bulletins on your nascent startup written up on information websites. However lacking in plenty of the “go direct” sermonizing is that the latter level has all the time been the case! There have lengthy been method too many firms for the media to report on in a method that will transfer the needle, both for you, or for them. A fair stranger concept typically bundled with “go direct” is that it’s best to by no means even talk with journalists. In fact as soon as you use at a big sufficient scale, inbound media requests will flip up, and ignoring these is a misplaced alternative at finest, and reckless at worst, so this sort of recommendation is, with out exaggeration, malpractice.
• “YouTube and TikTok are making text-based information media irrelevant”: It is true individuals spend monumental quantities of time at this time studying about every little thing on these networks, and that features know-how, and even tech information. Furthermore, podcasts (that are often additionally hosted on YouTube), have most likely even diminished the strain to weblog for some. However an trade rife with purpose-driven information shoppers will proceed to demand the velocity, informational density, and scanability of text-based media. And so a gentle provide of text-based information will proceed to fulfill that demand.
• “X is all you must keep on high of tech information”: It could actually actually really feel that method once you dip into high-engagement subcommunities or witness riveting interactions between newsmakers. Specifically, subcommunities like “AI Twitter”, which embody many trade notables, are so rife with chatter and gossip that information will usually break there, or at the very least floor there in a short time after breaking elsewhere. However these communities are the truth is the exception to the rule. There are large and vital sectors of the broader tech trade nearly utterly absent from X daily. And there are tech tales attracting appreciable chatter on LinkedIn, Bluesky, and Threads which can be DOA on X. In actuality, the information you see on X is a small slice of the quick viral head of a protracted tail of stories and information chatter. And this actually should not come as a shock: most individuals aren’t lively X customers, even in tech, and only a few individuals really put up with any frequency.
• “Ignore what’s on Bluesky or Threads”: When you’ve heard this, it is most likely from somebody common on X who’s gotten dogpiled by the perimeter left on Bluesky. And to be clear, these dynamics are actual, disagreeable, and one thing I might think about Bluesky administration considers an issue, since repelling notable posters can crimp total development. However the typical expertise for a typical Bluesky person isn’t in contrast to basic Twitter: individuals comply with individuals they’re involved in and interactions are typically constructive. Furthermore, partially by not imposing the “hyperlink penalty”, sufficient journalists who joined Bluesky in prior years have caught round that it usually seems like the present house of “tech journalism Twitter”, together with the kind of conversations that stretch from that. Threads has gotten a nasty rap for comparable causes, although with Meta shepherding thousands and thousands of customers every week to the app, the userbase now feels very normie. A number of journalists and different information pundits in tech contemplate this an viewers they cannot ignore, so you will discover tech news-relevant conversations there as effectively. So whereas neither community has surpassed X when it comes to tech trade information commentary (and each have a protracted strategy to go on AI, VC, and crypto chatter), if you happen to care what individuals say on X, it’s best to keep watch over the opposite networks too.

To summarize, a bunch of individuals in tech with a vested curiosity in basically turning into the media are hoping you will consider the world of stories dissemination has turned utterly the other way up. After which conveniently the corners of the web the place they’ve a foothold simply so occur to be the longer term! However it’s best to the truth is consider your individual eyes: sure, information has advanced significantly with the web, however journalists are nonetheless fairly often the earliest to chronicle plenty of what we have to learn about how the trade is altering. Not so shockingly, information professionals drive information. And there are networks taking part in a job in information different than simply the one owned by the world’s richest man.

So in brief, as lots in media modifications, lots stays the identical. And Techmeme’s consistency is a product of what is fixed in on-line media.

Will Techmeme stay constant for one more 20 years?

Truthfully, we do not know. Regardless that we now have 20 years behind us, projecting 20 years sooner or later feels foolhardy. And this has been a tricky week to even think about the place our nation might be in 20 years. However I can listing few common instructions we’re contemplating for our continued work over the following few years, and so they all construct on, and never upend, what we have achieved:

• Participation: Just lately we have launched new methods for newsmakers and comms professionals to explicitly tip hyperlinks. Below each headline on our desktop web page an “Add Hyperlink Right here” button seems once you hover over the information, and we’re blissful so as to add any secondary hyperlink (LinkedIn posts, tweets, weblog posts, and many others.) rounding out our aggregation for that story. And whereas we’re fussier about that includes new top-level headlines, we now have a type for tipping these as effectively. I consider there are various different methods enter from customers may enhance the location and stay up for introducing options to solicit this enter.
• Customization: Whereas each reader of our homepage sees the identical Techmeme, for over 5 years we have provided aggregation companies that allow firms uncover trending or carefully-filtered information in actual time. Clients embody tech firms of all sizes, together with tech giants, in addition to VC corporations, who’re particularly thrilled with our portfolio information monitoring. If you would like to seek out out what we will do for you, e mail .
• Growth: What I have not but talked about right here is that alongside Techmeme we function aggregation websites monitoring different information verticals, like Mediagazer for media, and even websites working with no human editors, like memeorandum for US politics. I consider by including extra smarts (significantly LLM-enabled intelligence) throughout our software program platform, including extra high quality information verticals over time turns into attainable.

It is a tech trade cliche, however I actually really feel we’re in the beginning of our mission right here. So thanks for becoming a member of us throughout our first 20 years, and I hope you will get pleasure from what lies forward. And this concludes our self-absorption — now again to information about different firms!