Casey Newton is the former Senior editor at ‘The Verge’ & creator of ‘The Interface’.
In 2020, after seven years covering tech companies at The Verge, Casey announced his decision to start a newsletter on Substack called Platformer, and the team at Substack invited me to work with Casey Newton to design the brand.
The design boasts a high-tech, glossy surface complete with vibrant gradients and reflectiveness. I was going for a design that captured Casey’s vibrant personality, creating a design thatresonates with the gaming world where we navigate from one platform to another. This concept mirrors the essence of modern life, where we seamlessly jump between platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube. Collaborating with Casey on this design was an enjoyable experience, capturing the dynamic essence of the publication.
As Casey put it:
I’m calling it ‘Platformer’ — it informs you about platforms. But also in video games, a platformer is one where you jump from platform to platform, and to me, that’s the defining quality of modern life. We go from Twitter to Facebook to YouTube and back.’
Unsurprisingly, Casey was an early adopter of Substack, joining in 2020. He had this to say about his decision to join Substack:
They’re really helping writers build communities, they’re helping readers discover new writers, and some writers are having this incredible success out there on their own.
Casey has been incredibly successful amassing a huge readership of more than a hundreds thousand readers.
After seven years covering tech companies at The Verge, Casey launched Platformer last year —
a wildly successful publication that breaks serious news and has the eyes of Silicon Valley
leaders focused on it. Casey is whipsmart and funny and a truly generous writer.
— Anne Helen Petersen
Collaborating with Casey on this design was heaps of fun.
Also read: “Casey Newton on Leaving ‘The Verge’ for Substack and the Future of Tech Journalism”