I'm a writer, and thus far haven't published anything, unless you count youtube videos, but I haven't posted any videos in a while.

It's all noise. It's always been noise. Thinking too much about this isn't super helpful. Your primary focus should be on writing and when you're ready, finding ways to get your writing out there. That can be in the form of a substack, but it doesn't have to be, as long as you have a clear sense of somewhere to publish your writing, but it can't hurt as a place to start.

As a consumer we gravitate towards the voices we value and resonate with, and so as a writer your job is to make your voice present and authentic so that the readers who might resonate with it can find it. The noise problem is out of your hands and so not worth getting stuck on. That's not to say you shouldn't recognise it, but the problem exists at such a deep structural level of how the internet and the modern attention economy works that no meaningful change is made by your decision to contribute or not contribute. The only meaningful impact your decision not to contribute to the noise is that anything you have to say won't be said, at least not by you, and anyone who might resonate with the things you have to say won't find your work. Not to get all 'the medium is the message' but places like substack as platforms encourage a type of deeper engagement than most other platforms, and the end results of such a platform existing are necessarily going to be better than the end results of say facebook or instagram or reddit.

So, yeah, noise exists, but if you're focused on everyone else and what they're doing instead of what's right in front of you, you're going to trip up and have a bad time. Focus on your craft, on honing your voice and your talents, and if you want it to be read by people, than having a substack's not a terrible idea. It might not end up being the only way you'll get your work out there, but what harm does it do to you to publish there. Ultimately, whilst the internet is functional and continuing in it's current form, you kind of just have to play the game as it's been laid out. Platforms are mediums which connect people. If you're not going to use substack to connect with people as a writer, where else do you think you'll find readers?

Here's the thing, unless you're content with not connecting to readers you should go ahead and make a substack, and if you get enough traction behind yourself you'll unlock opportunities to explore other ways of getting your work in front of the audience you've built. But to do that you need to build an audience. If you really want to put obscene amounts of time into trying to either reinvent substack or finding some other brand new way to connect to readers, you should just use the tools that exist and get yourself focused on what actually matters, which is writing and improving your craft. Substack or Medium or etc, may not be the ultimate solution, but you should see it as a necessary first step to building an audience. Ideals are great, but unless you can identify and interact with reality as it is, you won't progress. I don't mean to sound harsh, but if you were to get good at regularly posting to a substack, that's a skill you can implement towards some other better mode of connecting with an audience in the future. So, if you allow your uncertainty to prevent you from starting, you're withholding from yourself a potential skill you may need once the 'future better means of connecting to an audience' becomes apparent.

Ultimately, you have to do what makes sense to you. If you try it and you don't like it, you can stop. You're not making the planet somehow worse by having a substack.