After Years Of Declining Views, Tor Books Author John Scalzi Abandons His Whatever Blog As His Daughter Athena Takes Over
John Scalzi used to be known as the most powerful blogger in science fiction, but his decline has been a rapid one in recent years. Now, it seems he’s thrown in the towel as his daughter Athena has announced she’ll be taking over the Whatever blog going forward.
In 2012, John Scalzi’s blog was the place to be for anyone interested in science fiction. His blog popularity and traffic as an influencer led to him getting massive multi-million dollar contracts at Tor Books and industry insiders giving him multiple Hugo Awards.
In 2016, Scalzi revealed a small chink in the armor of his online presence, as he reported his blog traffic as falling, coinciding with the first election of Donald Trump as President of the United States. With his push toward extreme liberalism and social justice, Scalzi turned off a portion of his originally military sci-fi reading audience as he pivoted toward what he perceived to be mainstream clout.
His blog saw an 11% traffic drop from a 2015 self-reported number of 5.8 million site visits (close to 500,000 a month) in that year, but it seems to have gotten far worse in recent years as his online persona has made sure that half the country or more is not interested in what he has to offer with his extreme political takes.
It’s gotten so bad that he doesn’t report his blog stats at the end of the year anymore, instead giving updates about his life in general. He vows in 2025 he will “spend more time on friendships and community,” which is usually a self-reflection that things are not going very well.
Despite his not posting his stats, using online statistical sources, Fandom Pulse estimates his monthly traffic to be anywhere from 150,000-200,000 on an average month, less than half of what it was only eight years ago. Fandom Pulse, by contrast, is doing well over 300,000 per month in our first month full time, making this Substack the most trafficked blog in science fiction.
Another sign John Scalzi doesn’t view his blog traffic as doing well is that he’s now conscripted his daughter to take over Whatever.
She posted, “Hello, everyone! If you saw my father’s post yesterday, then you know that some changes that have been in the works for a while now are finally here. Mainly, I have been passed the torch that is Whatever, and I plan to carry it proudly.”
“For a few years now, I have been contributing pieces to the blog. In these years I have gone through phases of posting somewhat consistently to barely posting at all. Recently, my contributions have certainly been infrequent to say the least. The blog has always been a part-time, mostly low priority thing for me, and was more or less just if I wanted to write something, I was free to do so.”
“But now begins a new era.”
“While this blog is still Whatever (meaning that the posts have been and always be varied content based on what we feel like posting), there are certain reoccurring segments that I would like to do. Some of these ideas are things that I have been doing already, some are relics from the past that I will be reviving, and some will be new.”
“For the most part, a lot of what you can expect from me is more of the same; like movie reviews, checking out restaurants, recipe testing, travel writing, etc. I’d like to reintroduce Small Business Saturday posts, do more artist features, and keep things fresh with random events and/or experiences that I go to and report back on.”
It appears as part of John Scalzi moving his focus to “community” means he’s abandoning the community that built his blog and made it into a powerhouse for science fiction. Offloading the task is an indication he doesn’t view it as a good use of his time at this juncture, which only can result in the blog getting less traffic over time as there are not many who head to the site to read the writings of Athena Scalzi.
The landscape of science fiction is shifting as mainstream establishment icons are falling at rapid rates, allowing for new, different voices to present the future.
For a great alternative science fiction story with thriller action, read The Stars Entwined on Amazon!
Some inside baseball on this situation. His daughter turned 26 this year, which meant that she couldn't remain on her parents health care. To resolve this, John formed a new corporation to handle his business interests outside of his writing contracts and hired his wife and daughter as the company's only employees. There's a series of posts about his wife retiring to run this company and his daughter joining as marketing director. Since the IRS takes a very dim view of high net worth individuals forming shell companies just to employ relatives, he has to be very performative about what this company, and his family members, will be doing.
Brandon, if you're reading this, know that this is the future you choose.