Over the years from February 2013 to April 2025 on ACX and SSC, Scott has written over 1,702 articles and around 5,429,721 words. This would take around 583h 50min to read, and gathered over 582,761 comments.
The longest article was around 35,224 words long, and the average article is around 3,190 words (median: 2,292 words). The most commented article got 2,155 comments, and the average article gets around 342 comments (median: 270 comments).
You can find stats related to the SSC podcast over here.
All stats exclude Open Thread and Meetup posts. Comment count is saved on posts older than a month. Reading speed is calibrated to out-loud reading speed of 155 words per minute (silent reading speed is usually 200-250 wpm, one source giving a 238 wpm average).
You'll notice there's a sharp drop in 2020 - that's when Scott deleted the Slate Star Codex blog following the New York Times doxxing threats and there was no writing for ~6 months. You might also notice there is an increase in the number of words written per post (and total words) after that. I explored multiple explanations for that: a different way of counting words when switching blogs, more "Highlights from the Comments on..." posts in ACX (which are pretty long posts quoting other people), more book reviews, but when I checked it didn't seem to fit the observed difference.
It took me some time to find the obvious probable explanation: SubStack is paying well enough, and Scott has more time to write longer and more frequent articles. Go subscribe!
I assume the increase in average comment count when switching to ACX on SubStack in 2021 is in part due to SubStack (and maybe the NYT drama) improving readership and engagement.
You'll notice there's a sharp drop in 2020 - that's when Scott deleted the Slate Star Codex blog following the New York Times doxxing threats and there was no writing for ~6 months. You might also notice there is an increase in the number of words written per post (and total words) after that. I explored multiple explanations for that: a different way of counting words when switching blogs, more "Highlights from the Comments on..." posts in ACX (which are pretty long posts quoting other people), more book reviews, but when I checked it didn't seem to fit the observed difference.
It took me some time to find the obvious probable explanation: SubStack is paying well enough, and Scott has more time to write longer and more frequent articles. Go subscribe!
I assume the increase in average comment count when switching to ACX on SubStack in 2021 is in part due to SubStack (and maybe the NYT drama) improving readership and engagement.
You'll notice there's a sharp drop in 2020 - that's when Scott deleted the Slate Star Codex blog following the New York Times doxxing threats and there was no writing for ~6 months. You might also notice there is an increase in the number of words written per post (and total words) after that. I explored multiple explanations for that: a different way of counting words when switching blogs, more "Highlights from the Comments on..." posts in ACX (which are pretty long posts quoting other people), more book reviews, but when I checked it didn't seem to fit the observed difference.
It took me some time to find the obvious probable explanation: SubStack is paying well enough, and Scott has more time to write longer and more frequent articles. Go subscribe!
I assume the increase in average comment count when switching to ACX on SubStack in 2021 is in part due to SubStack (and maybe the NYT drama) improving readership and engagement.