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 previous at the moment. That is our self-congratulatory submit marking the event. Please share, retweet, and provide your sincerest congratulations. And because of so a lot of you for studying us all these years.

Now if Techmeme is new to you, this is a brief definition: Techmeme is a information aggregator highlighting the most recent information studies that tech trade leaders want to pay attention to, positioned alongside contrasting views from social media and different shops.

Now that is slightly boring, so this is a extra grandiose description: Techmeme is the one important information web site for tech founders, execs, buyers, innovators, writers, and various thought leaders. It achieves this the one method doable: by being an aggregator that hyperlinks out to one of the best studies on the most recent key occasions in tech, ranks them, and commingles them with essentially the most notable posts from social media and past. It is made doable by means of a novel strategy to curation combining algorithms with a group of human editors. The result’s a web site trade leaders go to every day to replace their priors (so to talk) earlier than diving deeper at extra specialised journalistic shops, newsletters, boards like HN or Reddit, and networks like X/LinkedIn/Threads/Bluesky. In contrast to an RSS reader, Techmeme isn’t one thing you customise. Relatively, everybody sees the identical Techmeme, so it’s the trade’s shared context.

Techmeme has remained absurdly constant

A milestone akin to this calls for that we replicate and generate pithy takeaways, for the followers or at the very least for the perpetual gaping maw of AI fashions. Fortuitously, 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 expertise, the online, and information have modified so profoundly. In 2005 Techmeme was a free, single-page web site, repeatedly rating and organizing hyperlinks from information shops, private websites, and company websites, and it stays so in 2025. After all 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 firms nonetheless (fortunately) publish to the open internet, even when a lot of the article textual content is paywalled. A lot of the extra attention-grabbing tech information tales nonetheless seem first on information websites (extra on this under), even because the publications identified 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 number of of the notable indie tech bloggers from 2005 stay so at the moment (hat tip to Gruber, Om, and Simon!)

Consistency has not come simple

Sadly for us, an array of developments has made this consistency fairly difficult to keep up. Foremost amongst these is that crawling information websites has turn out to be rather more troublesome in recent times. Scanning the total textual content of reports articles is essential for us as a result of the algorithms that alert our editors to information and set up our dwelling web page depend on analyzing that textual content. Whereas it is difficult sufficient that a substantial amount of information is now paywalled, a extra severe problem is that with the rise of LLMs, many web sites now merely block all bots aside from a small variety of search engines like google and yahoo.

And so in 2025 we discover ourselves repeatedly 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 study their front-end group has inadvertently knocked them off of Techmeme, and normally shortly arrive at a treatment, however the course of provides lots of friction to an enterprise 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 in the event you’re involved you are blocking Techmeme’s crawler, please tell us at .)

One other difficult pattern 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 talk about 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 accessible for us throughout all networks seems decrease than what we loved a decade in the past.

This final result is not solely detrimental, nonetheless: fragmentation of social networks means the general ecosystem is extra resilient towards the decay of anyone community. Some commentators discover the newer networks extra engaging or welcoming than yesterday’s Twitter or at the moment’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 pattern price mentioning right here has put the squeeze on one income. As everyone knows, Google’s and Meta’s immense success in adverts 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 consumers 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 maintain the advert high quality excessive, however at instances it has narrowed the funnel. (Apart: in the event you’re all for selling content material or occasions on Techmeme, attain us at !)

A surviving and thriving tech press makes our consistency doable

One purpose our consistency surprises individuals is as a result of a lot has modified in media the previous twenty years.But often I encounter individuals in tech who communicate as if a type of media rapture has occurred, and we have all been transported to a wholly new and unrecognizable airplane. The world they depict is predicated on a number of unusual new concepts that I wish to look at right here. The concepts are promulgated in plenty of locations, however primarily by means of the tweets from an assortment of trade notables. In case you spend sufficient time on tech Twitter, you have encountered all the following. It is price stating up entrance that there are kernels of fact on the heart 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 the moment is simply resentment-fueled score-settling towards 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 concentrate on the detrimental. This focus in fact comes a lot simpler in recent times given the numerous aggressive strikes by tech firms which have now amassed unprecedented energy. However the output from these reporters are narratives nonetheless based mostly on info. After which on the identical time, many extra reporters occupy completely different positions on the ideological spectrum. Basically, reporters are careerists whose craft is constructing narratives based mostly on info, and the businesses paying for essentially the most consequential journalism are profit-seeking shops usually supported by subscribers who work primarily in enterprise. Bloomberg and The Data will not be right here to destroy Silicon Valley, clearly. They exist to generate profits by means 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 shops have loads in widespread with native newspapers. In actuality, shops like Bloomberg, WSJ, The Data, FT, and NYT, and newsletters like Newcomer, Platformer, and Stratechery are doing moderately advantageous financially. You may 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 maintain sharing screenshots of reports articles from tech reporters.
• “Citizen journalism is the way forward for media”: The primary 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 info to the data house. And let’s agree it is nice that many limitations to producing journalism have fallen away. Nevertheless it’s uncertain individuals simply posting observations to social media with out doing reporting will displace journalism, and in the event you do not consider me, effectively, that is one thing {the marketplace} will resolve in time.
• “The perfect media technique for a founder is to ‘go direct’”: The individuals repeating this mantra are proper about two key issues: first, to the extent 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 second, it is normally not definitely worth the effort of making an attempt to get bulletins in your nascent startup written up on information websites. However lacking in lots 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 may transfer the needle, both for you, or for them. A good stranger thought typically bundled with “go direct” is that it’s best to by no means even talk with journalists. After all as soon as you use at a big sufficient scale, inbound media requests will flip up, and ignoring these is a misplaced alternative at greatest, 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 huge quantities of time at the moment studying about every little thing on these networks, and that features expertise, and even tech information. Furthermore, podcasts (that are normally additionally hosted on YouTube), have most likely even decreased the stress to weblog for some. However an trade rife with purpose-driven information customers will proceed to demand the velocity, informational density, and scanability of text-based media. And so a gradual provide of text-based information will proceed to fulfill that demand.
• “X is all it’s worthwhile to keep on prime of tech information”: It may definitely really feel that method while you dip into high-engagement subcommunities or witness riveting interactions between newsmakers. Particularly, 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 in reality the exception to the rule. There are large and essential sectors of the broader tech trade nearly utterly absent from X day after day. And there are tech tales attracting appreciable chatter on LinkedIn, Bluesky, and Threads which are DOA on X. In actuality, the information you see on X is a small slice of the brief viral head of a protracted tail of reports and information chatter. And this actually should not come as a shock: most individuals aren’t energetic X customers, even in tech, and only a few individuals truly submit with any frequency.
• “Ignore what’s on Bluesky or Threads”: In case you’ve heard this, it is most likely from somebody in style 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 general development. However the typical expertise for a typical Bluesky person isn’t in contrast to traditional Twitter: individuals comply with individuals they’re all for and interactions are usually optimistic. Furthermore, partially by not imposing the “hyperlink penalty”, sufficient journalists who joined Bluesky in prior years have caught round that it usually looks like the present dwelling of “tech journalism Twitter”, together with the type of conversations that reach from that. Threads has gotten a foul rap for comparable causes, although with Meta shepherding tens of millions of customers every week to the app, the userbase now feels very normie. A variety of journalists and different information pundits in tech take into account 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 technique to go on AI, VC, and crypto chatter), in the event you care what individuals say on X, it’s best to control the opposite networks too.

To summarize, a bunch of individuals in tech with a vested curiosity in basically changing into the media are hoping you will consider the world of reports dissemination has turned utterly the wrong way up. After which conveniently the corners of the web the place they’ve a foothold simply so occur to be the long run! However it’s best to in reality consider your personal eyes: sure, information has developed significantly with the web, however journalists are nonetheless fairly often the earliest to chronicle lots of what we have to find out about how the trade is altering. Not so shockingly, information professionals drive information. And there are networks taking part in a task in information different than simply the one owned by the world’s richest man.

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

Will Techmeme stay constant for an additional 20 years?

Actually, we do not know. Although we’ve got 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 shall be in 20 years. However I can checklist few normal instructions we’re contemplating for our continued work over the subsequent 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. Beneath each headline on our desktop web page an “Add Hyperlink Right here” button seems while you hover over the information, and we’re completely happy so as to add any secondary hyperlink (LinkedIn posts, tweets, weblog posts, and so forth.) 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 numerous 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 supplied aggregation companies that permit 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 search out out what we will do for you, e mail .
• Enlargement: 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 (notably 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 initially 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!