Monday 11th October: Why give up the freedom to do your own newsletter?

October 11, 2021

Good morning! Today's newsletter is brought to you by Chris.

Our newsletter provider is Revue. We struck lucky in a sense - it turns out that most Substack signups are driven by Twitter anyway, and Twitter's acquisition of Revue means you can sign up to our newsletter directly from Twitter itself. And as we've previously discussed on the podcast, newsletter superstars can almost dictate their own terms.

Now The Atlantic is hiring newsletter writers, and it also wants their subscribers. Crucially: "The Atlantic isn’t hiring the writers as full-time employees, but will offer them some sort of base payment with the ability to make additional money if they hit certain subscriber goals. So it’s a much more reliable income source than a paid newsletter — even Casey Newton."

Newton's previously stated that his churn rate was around 4%. That continues to be the biggest potential challenge for anyone looking to make a living from their own newsletters - so we can understand why The Atlantic's approach might make sense.

Shameless plug for my latest article for DCN! Metered and freemium paywalls offer a little taste of publisher content. But how much to give away for free is a constantly evolving conversation. Here's how different sectors are dealing with it.

My job is to write about tech and I don't really understand why this is happening. But nevertheless, there will inevitably be a burst of publishers looking to get into the metaverse in the near future, so you should know about this as an early entrant into the field.

Teen Vogue has been among the best outlets for political commentary over the past few years. The New Yorker states "Instagram and TikTok erased the authority of the traditional teen magazine, but teenagers still want guidance and a community" - which is true! But to what end?

This week's podcast:

On this week’s episode we hear from The New Republic’s Literary Editor Laura Marsh. She tells us about what makes working in an audio format especially rewarding, discovering famous literary contributors, and why non-news content is such a good touchpoint for audiences.

If you're enjoying our newsletter and/or podcast, you can buy us a virtual coffee on our Ko-Fi page to keep us going, or you can chip in a bit every month with a recurring subscription. Every single one is truly appreciated, and you'll make young Peter very happy.