Rachel Nguyen is creating outside the algorithm
“Fuck buying the $5 Instagram ad, put $5 into a creator's pockets.”
Embedded is your essential guide to what’s good on the internet, from Kate Lindsay and Nick Catucci.
If you create on the internet, in any way, I guarantee this conversation will speak to everything you’re struggling with right now. —Kate
Ironically, I discovered Rachel Nguyen thanks to an algorithm. I say ironically because when her December, 2020 “POINT OF VIEW” vlog came up on my screen via YouTube’s robot-recommendation, I realized I was watching something I hadn’t seen on the internet in some time: a piece of art created totally outside trends. The vlog followed none of the familiar rhythmic, algorithmically-driven patterns of the days-in-the-life I normally consume, but was instead a mixed media event composed entirely of a screen recording of Nguyen’s own computer.
While I was just meeting Nguyen, the creator has been on the internet for some time. In addition to her YouTube channel, which she started in 2013, she also ran the blog ThatsChic and has worked with brands like Glossier and on projects like We’re Not Really Strangers. Our interview was one of those in which the conversation quickly took on a life of its own. I knew instantly it would be one of my favorites.
I went into the chat jealous of the freedom with which Nguyen creates on the internet, seemingly immune to the pressures of clicks and the whims of changing algorithms. I learned that it is, of course, not that simple—something she teaches in her Video Creator course. In this interview for paid subscribers, Nguyen and I spoke about how to create authentically on the internet, what we owe to our audiences, and the importance of reallocating our resources to individual creators, not brands.