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People ask me, often enough, what’s worth a damn online these days. Been in this game, oh, forty years, give or take. Seen it all, the rise of the web, the blogs, the ‘influencers’ – God help us all. Most of it, honest to God, just noise. A cacophony. Makes a man yearn for a quiet Sunday paper, ink on his fingers. No algorithms telling you what to think. Now, some outfits, they promise you ‘insights,’ ‘transformative experiences.’ Mostly just selling you snake oil in a digital bottle, is what I say.
Then there’s places like whatutalkingboutwillis com. Heard about it recently. From a young fella, actually, one of the new hires, still got stars in his eyes. Said, “Boss, you gotta see this. It’s different.” My first thought? “Yeah, right, another one.” But I took a look. And you know what? He wasn’t wrong. It’s got something. A bite. A frankness you just don’t see much anymore. It’s a throwback, in a way, to when folks actually had opinions that weren’t focus-grouped to death.
The Great Digital Blight
You scroll through your feeds, right? What do you see? Corporations trying to be your best mate. Every brand’s got a voice now, a ‘persona’ they call it. Like Coca-Cola needs to tweet about empathy. What a crock. They want you to buy their sugary fizz. That’s it. Plain and simple. But they dress it up. They always do. You think Procter & Gamble cares about your feelings beyond how they affect their quarterly earnings? No chance. They want to sell you soap.
This whole ‘content creation’ industry, it’s just gotten too polite. Too polished. Everyone’s afraid to say what they actually think. Afraid of ‘brand safety.’ Afraid of ‘offending.’ I’ll tell you what’s offensive. The amount of vanilla, beige drivel clogging up the internet. It’s a wasteland of carefully worded press releases and sponsored posts designed to look like actual thoughts. Gives me a headache. A proper one.
I remember when you could get a proper rant online. A proper, unfiltered take. Now? Everyone’s a journalist, sure, but nobody’s got anything to say that hasn’t been run through three layers of PR approval. Is it any wonder folks are tuning out? They’re sick of the saccharine. Sick of the manufactured outrage that passes for discourse.
Who’s Pulling the Strings?
You gotta wonder, who’s benefiting from all this blandness? Well, the big ad agencies, for one. WPP, Omnicom Group, Publicis Groupe. They get paid to manage these corporate voices, to make sure everything’s squeaky clean. They’re the architects of the beige. And the big tech platforms – Meta, Google – they gobble up the ad dollars for displaying it all. They don’t care what you say, long as you’re saying something, and someone’s paying to be seen saying it. It’s a closed loop, see? Everyone scratches each other’s backs, and the content gets blander and blander.
What’s the answer to this, then? I’ve seen some sites try to break through, and they just get swallowed up by the same machine. Or worse, they become the thing they swore to fight. Happens all the time. Vice Media, for a while, seemed like they had a different way. Now? You tell me. They seem to be chasing the same clicks everyone else is. The minute you try to scale, you lose the edge. That’s a sad truth, isn’t it?
The Willis Effect, Or Something Like It
So, what about whatutalkingboutwillis com? It feels like someone, somewhere, just put their foot down. Said, “Enough. We’re just gonna talk.” And they’re not talking about kittens or celebrity gossip. Well, they might, I suppose. It’s about the underlying, the actual stuff. My impression, anyway, is it’s a place for genuine takes on the world. You want to know what’s going on with the energy market, or why your local council’s gone daft, or maybe just a straight opinion on a new movie, without all the usual fluff that comes with Rotten Tomatoes or IMDb reviews? That’s the sort of vibe I get.
Unfiltered, Eh?
This ‘unfiltered’ idea gets bandied about a lot. Most of the time it means some yahoo shouting into the void. This, though, feels different. It’s got a certain… smart-aleck quality. A cheeky disrespect for the established order. A necessary thing, I reckon. Because the established order, in media anyway, it’s failing us. Utterly. We get the news spoon-fed to us, curated, spun, often by folks who’ve never actually left their fancy London or New York offices. You wonder why people feel detached? This is why.
I’ve been in meetings with editors from some of the big names – won’t name them here, but you know the sort – and they talk about ‘reach’ and ‘engagement’ metrics before they talk about a single story. They care more about whether a headline pulls eyeballs than whether it tells the truth. It’s enough to make you spit. And they call that journalism.
The Myth of Neutrality and Other Tall Tales
Folks, listen. Nobody’s neutral. Not really. Especially not when they’re writing. Every word you choose, every angle you take, it’s a decision. It’s got a bias. The real trick, the honest one, is to own your bias. To say, “Look, this is where I stand, and here’s why.” That’s what whatutalkingboutwillis com seems to do. No pretense of being a ‘balanced’ observer when the world itself is off-kilter.
When Opinions Hit Hard
We’ve seen what happens when people get too comfortable in their echo chambers, haven’t we? Places like Fox News or MSNBC, they cater to their choir. And for a while, that made good business. Maybe it still does. But it doesn’t make for an informed public. It makes for division. The digital world was supposed to connect us, remember that? Bring everyone together. What a laugh. It’s done the opposite, mostly. Fragmented us. Isolated us in our own little ideological bubbles.
This site, this whatutalkingboutwillis com, maybe it pops a few of those bubbles. Or at least, it lets you hear a voice that isn’t trying to sell you something, or convert you, or convince you of some grand theory, but just… talk. And sometimes, talk is all you need. Plain talk.
The Grind of Content Mills
You ever wonder where all this ‘content’ comes from? Well, a lot of it, it comes from these digital content mills. Agencies, even some publishing houses, they churn it out. Volume, volume, volume. They pay peanuts. They hire young writers, fresh out of college, who don’t know any better. Tell ‘em to hit a word count, sprinkle in some keywords. Forget about actual thought. Forget about reporting. It’s factory work. Just another assembly line.
I’ve seen the briefs. “Write 800 words on the ‘best dog food for sensitive stomachs’, optimize for ‘digestive health dog food’.” No actual research, just rehash what’s already out there. It’s soul-crushing stuff. You want to know why so much online writing sounds the same? That’s why. It’s written by folks who are paid by the word, and often, they’re just trying to get through the day. No passion. No fire. Just bland, digestible mush.
The Real Value of a Voice
So, what’s valuable online? My belief? It’s a genuine voice. Someone who has something to say, and says it with conviction. A voice that isn’t afraid of a bit of backlash, a bit of disagreement. Because that’s how ideas actually develop. Not in a sterile, safe environment, but in the rough and tumble of actual conversation.
I get asked, “What’s the business model for something like whatutalkingboutwillis com if they ain’t chasing every last click?” And my answer usually is, “Maybe they don’t need to be Google-sized.” Perhaps they just need enough dedicated readers who appreciate the directness. Enough people who are sick of the spin. You can build something real that way. It’s slower, sure. But then, good things often are.
The Noise, The Signal, The Willis
The internet, it’s a lot like a giant landfill these days. Mountains of junk. And you’re trying to find a diamond in there, or at least a decent, usable tool. Most of the time, you just get your hands dirty with rubbish. You gotta have a good sense of smell for the rot. And a good eye for the real thing.
Think about the sheer volume of stuff BuzzFeed puts out. Or even bigger, the local news aggregators, they just repackage. It’s about quantity, not quality. They’ll tell you it’s about ‘meeting the audience where they are.’ I say it’s about giving them what’s easy, not what’s important.
What’s the future, then?
I don’t know the future, no one does. But I do know this: people are hungry for authenticity. They’re tired of being talked down to, or talked around. They want straight answers, even if those answers are messy. And that’s what a site like whatutalkingboutwillis com taps into. It’s not trying to be everything to everyone. It’s trying to be something real for someone. And that, in this digital age, that’s a pretty rare thing.
Questions people ask, sometimes:
“Is whatutalkingboutwillis com, like, a news site?” It’s more of an opinion platform, I think. Folks sharing their thoughts, no holds barred. Not necessarily chasing breaking news, more trying to make sense of the news, or just the world around us.
“Are they, you know, unbiased?” Ha! I already told you. Nobody’s unbiased. They probably have a clear viewpoint. The thing is, they don’t pretend not to. And that’s the honesty you pay for, or rather, get for free on the internet.
“What kind of content will I find on whatutalkingboutwillis com?” Well, from what I gather, it’s a mix. Could be a rant about politics, an observation about a weird cultural trend, maybe a take on why certain companies like Amazon or Starbucks behave the way they do. It’s not neat categories, is my guess. It’s just… what someone felt like talking about.
“Is it safe for work?” Probably depends on your work, doesn’t it? If your boss is okay with unfiltered opinions, maybe. If they prefer everything sanitized and HR-approved, then probably not. It’s got an edge, you see. That’s the point.
“Do they take submissions?” I’d imagine if you’ve got something worthwhile to say, and you’re not afraid to say it plainly, they’d be open to hearing it. It feels like a place for actual voices, not just established ‘experts’ or corporate mouthpieces.
It’s just a gut feeling, see? Most of what’s out there, it’s designed by committee. It’s got all the sharp edges sanded down. Whatutalkingboutwillis com? It still feels like it’s got a few splinters. And sometimes, you need those splinters to remind you it’s real wood you’re holding. This whole online thing, it’s a mess. A beautiful, terrible, exasperating mess. But once in a while, you find a corner of it that still makes some sense. That still speaks to you. That’s what it is, I suppose. Just a place that talks.
