Thanks so much for the transparency, for living your values and for making your own journey and considerations an open book for others to learn from. Everything you do makes me admire you even more!
I appreciate this - even as someone who is both unlikely and disinclined to build a paid subscriber following here. I've noticed some of the trends you pointed out and the increasing pressure (incentivizing) to get contributors to dig into more features in order to scream for attentiom.
I was also oblivious to some other disturbing trends you've identified.
I am here because you're here. That is what recommended this platform to me, first as a reader and only recently as a writer with posts of my own. I look forward to following your platform search as I will likely be there, too, as a reader for sure. As for writing, you have offered solid reasons for anyone to move...although I suspect I will land in a different place that will be right-sized for the likes of me.
Thank you so much for sharing with such openness. I appreciate your perspective very much. I used Flodesk for 3 years and really enjoyed the platform. They always listened to feedback, made changes based on community recommendations, and are women-owned. I have sent many a support email and always received a kind and thorough response from a human. All those elements brought a lot of value IMO.
I came here to substack in October 2023 because I liked that I could easily publish my writing and have it all live in one space, exactly as you mentioned. I stopped my annual Flodesk account just a few months ago because I needed to cut some costs for my solo biz and substack gave me the ability to keep publishing without a fee. And I will say, all of my designed content, previous newsletters, and automations are still completely accessible in my Flodesk account. I didn't lose anything when I stopped my annual subscription and it is all still there for me if I go back. That was a nice plus because it didn't feel like my archive was going to just disappear.
My list is small, and I don't monetize it (sometimes it leads to a booked project but not regularly or consistently). I really do it to connect with readers and other writers. I do feel like that the discovery aspect is more accessible here on substack. My list has very slowly grown here over the last year but even so, it's more than what I was getting from my website where my Flodesk subscribe form was embedded (I'm no longer active on Instagram or other social media platforms so I'm not driving traffic from other places). Even still, discovery here feels more and more algorithmic and echo-chamber-ish as of late.
I've been observing all the things you've mentioned for the last few months here on substack and totally understand the desire to move and find the best place for you. That valid conversation is happening a lot, and I'm giving myself this year to see how things continue to roll out.
The reminder to look further into terms of services and your overall transparency is so helpful and appreciated. I hope the transition is smooth and that you can check as many boxes as possible to make it work for you. I'll be subscribed wherever you land. <3
Also, whoa. Thanks for receiving my giant comment.
I never reached 100k on Substack - not even close. I came here when my patrons on Patreon started dwindling week after week. I built a pretty decent following there that earned me about 60k/year. But it’s just like you said, non-committed- White-guilt-support disappeared. So I can personally attest that everything you’ve shared is true for just about every Black creator I know. I saw my Patreon drop from 60k to about 15k even though the value of my content hadn’t changed. And I’ve never been able to bring in more than 20/30k a year on Substack with 3k free & paid combined subscribers. It’s frustrating. Most weeks whatever I post is really just for myself.
I could say more about basic-ass newsletters with massive audiences and how they depress and discourage me because they never have to bleed out to be appreciated - but I won’t do that here. Honestly, I’m not mad so much as I’m just perplexed.
I hope you find a great place to land. I love what you create. Can’t wait to see what you build.
Substack used to also have a robust framework for supporting/uplifting marginalized voices. But I’ve been witnessing a complete abandonment of that in favor of white voices with large audiences that don’t fluctuate (like ours do).
As a freelance writer, I find that I am constantly balancing the revenue streams that are decent with my own desire for expansion and trying something new. As near as I can tell the only way to avoid this is to be independently wealthy or become a professor / full time institutional writer for the consistent pay.
Please please make sure to share how to access your writings!! I am in a group in Atlanta called ERACE which was started in New Orleans, and I have shared several of your writings particularly the bear or the man with our group. You are valued!!
Thank you for this very thorough explanation of the move. I am considering what my needs are and where to start too. I do subscribe to one writer on substack, but was unaware of the issue with not protecting people, which is important to be along with misinformation (let’s be honest lies, they are just lies.) your list of options is timely and gives me something to explore.
I’m down to follow you wherever you land, Austin. I have 1.4k subscribers on my Substack right now and I have had some concerns about the ways the platform is changing. I am here with so much trepidation.
You stay right here for as long as it works for you (just remember to have a back up of your list!) Your writing is beautiful and if/when you’re ready to leave, I believe your people will follow you. 💜
Your thoughtful take on all of this is very helpful. Thank you. I wish you a better experience when you've chosen where to land.
With that in mind, I can only offer my experience as some who receives a few newsletters that migrated from Substack to a couple of the other users you listed: Beehiiv and Buttondown. In both cases, I read the newsletters directly from email and only click through once in a while. They are simple and clean like Substack used to be and don't seem to have much going on in the way of other product offerings like Notes or Videos etc. I noticed that Beehiiv does let me click through to a simple page with the archive of the writer available to me which I like. The Buttondown one leads to a list that is more like a feed that makes it more challenging to search out issues I might want to revisit.
So appreciate your sharing! I’ll offer an experience - Kit - honestly and surprisingly been the least user friendly of the platforms I’ve used for newsletter or email marketing. Inflexible product and not great deliverability or reliable metrics, hard to make landing pages do anything except collect email addresses. I love tech, am a creative, and am at wits end with Kit.
Flodesk is easiest to get in and get out an attractive and easy to format email. Few extras, but other things are better for extras.
I had a similar experience with Kit. Very frustrating user interface.
I’ve been on flodesk for 5 years now. I’m still paying the same (very reasonable!) price. The functionality of the templates is definitely limited when it comes to sales pages and forms, but the email functionality is excellent and I know they will continue to add on the others. I’ve never been this consistent with my audience simply because the interface is so easy. I also have very high open rates with them (60% range).
I appreciate your thoughts on Substack and it’s definitely giving me important things to think about. Right now, I really love the engagement on this platform. The commitment to creatives. The fee is definitely high though, and you have so many amazing ways to redistribute that. May you feel clear and supported as you figure out the best configuration for your work!
Love your work. I appreciate your transparency in this post and your insistence generally on humanity in an inhuman world.
I wish you well finding a new platform. For what it's worth, my opinion is that Substack's story -- starting off wonderful and refreshingly idealistic, adding bells and whistles, and then gradually becoming toxic -- is the rule, not the exception. This is how high tech Capitalism works. Facebook was wonderful so long as people were snickering over it having never made a profit. It only became profitable when it had become sufficiently toxic in terms of selling user data, lying about privacy, failing to moderate content, and allowing gaping holes in its security for automated disinformation campaigns to proliferate. Medium has a similar story. This is not because the people are evil (many are of course.) It's because providing something that people truly need and value is not what pays under Capitalism. The entire tech model is to make something that is too good to be profitable and then when enough people have started to depend on it, have an IPO and sell it. Of course the quality takes a nose dive after that.
I don't mean to be critical of your move at all!! You need to find a space that works for you and that will probably be with a newer company. I'm just adding my perspective because I think all of these evils -- racism, sexism, and so-called economics -- are connected, and it's often fruitful to discuss them together.
I completely agree. Though I didn’t spell it out as you have done here, this what I was getting at with “no such thing as perfection”. Capitalism is a beast and choosing not to feed the beast is rare for sure. I don’t anticipate finding perfection, but I hope to find better.
I appreciate your comments and what you have shared Austin. Thanks for filling us all in. This is good to know about Substack. I appreciate the information. I too was unfortunately oblivious to the concerns that you mentioned and described. Thanks for all that you do. Best wishes moving forward. I will look out for where you land.
Thank you for bringing us along with you. You don't owe anyone explanations, but I love understanding your process and priorities. Can't wait to follow on this next adventure.
Thanks so much for the transparency, for living your values and for making your own journey and considerations an open book for others to learn from. Everything you do makes me admire you even more!
It’s tough to not pursue perfection (and admit when I prioritized $$$ over values). It’s messy but that’s the work. 💜
The work is hard. We appreciate the difference you make to so many. Thanks for your courage.
I appreciate this - even as someone who is both unlikely and disinclined to build a paid subscriber following here. I've noticed some of the trends you pointed out and the increasing pressure (incentivizing) to get contributors to dig into more features in order to scream for attentiom.
I was also oblivious to some other disturbing trends you've identified.
I am here because you're here. That is what recommended this platform to me, first as a reader and only recently as a writer with posts of my own. I look forward to following your platform search as I will likely be there, too, as a reader for sure. As for writing, you have offered solid reasons for anyone to move...although I suspect I will land in a different place that will be right-sized for the likes of me.
Yes… that “scream for attention” feels perpetuated by substack in a way that didn’t exist initially.
Thank you so much for sharing with such openness. I appreciate your perspective very much. I used Flodesk for 3 years and really enjoyed the platform. They always listened to feedback, made changes based on community recommendations, and are women-owned. I have sent many a support email and always received a kind and thorough response from a human. All those elements brought a lot of value IMO.
I came here to substack in October 2023 because I liked that I could easily publish my writing and have it all live in one space, exactly as you mentioned. I stopped my annual Flodesk account just a few months ago because I needed to cut some costs for my solo biz and substack gave me the ability to keep publishing without a fee. And I will say, all of my designed content, previous newsletters, and automations are still completely accessible in my Flodesk account. I didn't lose anything when I stopped my annual subscription and it is all still there for me if I go back. That was a nice plus because it didn't feel like my archive was going to just disappear.
My list is small, and I don't monetize it (sometimes it leads to a booked project but not regularly or consistently). I really do it to connect with readers and other writers. I do feel like that the discovery aspect is more accessible here on substack. My list has very slowly grown here over the last year but even so, it's more than what I was getting from my website where my Flodesk subscribe form was embedded (I'm no longer active on Instagram or other social media platforms so I'm not driving traffic from other places). Even still, discovery here feels more and more algorithmic and echo-chamber-ish as of late.
I've been observing all the things you've mentioned for the last few months here on substack and totally understand the desire to move and find the best place for you. That valid conversation is happening a lot, and I'm giving myself this year to see how things continue to roll out.
The reminder to look further into terms of services and your overall transparency is so helpful and appreciated. I hope the transition is smooth and that you can check as many boxes as possible to make it work for you. I'll be subscribed wherever you land. <3
Also, whoa. Thanks for receiving my giant comment.
I never reached 100k on Substack - not even close. I came here when my patrons on Patreon started dwindling week after week. I built a pretty decent following there that earned me about 60k/year. But it’s just like you said, non-committed- White-guilt-support disappeared. So I can personally attest that everything you’ve shared is true for just about every Black creator I know. I saw my Patreon drop from 60k to about 15k even though the value of my content hadn’t changed. And I’ve never been able to bring in more than 20/30k a year on Substack with 3k free & paid combined subscribers. It’s frustrating. Most weeks whatever I post is really just for myself.
I could say more about basic-ass newsletters with massive audiences and how they depress and discourage me because they never have to bleed out to be appreciated - but I won’t do that here. Honestly, I’m not mad so much as I’m just perplexed.
I hope you find a great place to land. I love what you create. Can’t wait to see what you build.
Substack used to also have a robust framework for supporting/uplifting marginalized voices. But I’ve been witnessing a complete abandonment of that in favor of white voices with large audiences that don’t fluctuate (like ours do).
As a freelance writer, I find that I am constantly balancing the revenue streams that are decent with my own desire for expansion and trying something new. As near as I can tell the only way to avoid this is to be independently wealthy or become a professor / full time institutional writer for the consistent pay.
Please please make sure to share how to access your writings!! I am in a group in Atlanta called ERACE which was started in New Orleans, and I have shared several of your writings particularly the bear or the man with our group. You are valued!!
Suzanne Schneider-ATL ERACE
Thank you for this very thorough explanation of the move. I am considering what my needs are and where to start too. I do subscribe to one writer on substack, but was unaware of the issue with not protecting people, which is important to be along with misinformation (let’s be honest lies, they are just lies.) your list of options is timely and gives me something to explore.
I hope it’s helpful. And many of these places have free versions or very low cost for a smaller list.
I’m down to follow you wherever you land, Austin. I have 1.4k subscribers on my Substack right now and I have had some concerns about the ways the platform is changing. I am here with so much trepidation.
You stay right here for as long as it works for you (just remember to have a back up of your list!) Your writing is beautiful and if/when you’re ready to leave, I believe your people will follow you. 💜
Thank you for believing in me 🥹🖤
Your thoughtful take on all of this is very helpful. Thank you. I wish you a better experience when you've chosen where to land.
With that in mind, I can only offer my experience as some who receives a few newsletters that migrated from Substack to a couple of the other users you listed: Beehiiv and Buttondown. In both cases, I read the newsletters directly from email and only click through once in a while. They are simple and clean like Substack used to be and don't seem to have much going on in the way of other product offerings like Notes or Videos etc. I noticed that Beehiiv does let me click through to a simple page with the archive of the writer available to me which I like. The Buttondown one leads to a list that is more like a feed that makes it more challenging to search out issues I might want to revisit.
Thank you so much for sharing your experience. I appreciate it
Thanks for making me aware of these issues - I hadn’t heard about the issue with your friend or Nazis, so that’s good to know.
I’m gonna keep doing Patreon - but want know what’s going on wherever else you are!
I’ll be waiting for you there 💜
So appreciate your sharing! I’ll offer an experience - Kit - honestly and surprisingly been the least user friendly of the platforms I’ve used for newsletter or email marketing. Inflexible product and not great deliverability or reliable metrics, hard to make landing pages do anything except collect email addresses. I love tech, am a creative, and am at wits end with Kit.
Flodesk is easiest to get in and get out an attractive and easy to format email. Few extras, but other things are better for extras.
Oh this helpful!
I had a similar experience with Kit. Very frustrating user interface.
I’ve been on flodesk for 5 years now. I’m still paying the same (very reasonable!) price. The functionality of the templates is definitely limited when it comes to sales pages and forms, but the email functionality is excellent and I know they will continue to add on the others. I’ve never been this consistent with my audience simply because the interface is so easy. I also have very high open rates with them (60% range).
I appreciate your thoughts on Substack and it’s definitely giving me important things to think about. Right now, I really love the engagement on this platform. The commitment to creatives. The fee is definitely high though, and you have so many amazing ways to redistribute that. May you feel clear and supported as you figure out the best configuration for your work!
I wonder how people feel about Medium. From what I can find, they have a good stance on LBGTQIA+ rights.
I’ve never been on it- as a writer or reader
Love your work. I appreciate your transparency in this post and your insistence generally on humanity in an inhuman world.
I wish you well finding a new platform. For what it's worth, my opinion is that Substack's story -- starting off wonderful and refreshingly idealistic, adding bells and whistles, and then gradually becoming toxic -- is the rule, not the exception. This is how high tech Capitalism works. Facebook was wonderful so long as people were snickering over it having never made a profit. It only became profitable when it had become sufficiently toxic in terms of selling user data, lying about privacy, failing to moderate content, and allowing gaping holes in its security for automated disinformation campaigns to proliferate. Medium has a similar story. This is not because the people are evil (many are of course.) It's because providing something that people truly need and value is not what pays under Capitalism. The entire tech model is to make something that is too good to be profitable and then when enough people have started to depend on it, have an IPO and sell it. Of course the quality takes a nose dive after that.
I don't mean to be critical of your move at all!! You need to find a space that works for you and that will probably be with a newer company. I'm just adding my perspective because I think all of these evils -- racism, sexism, and so-called economics -- are connected, and it's often fruitful to discuss them together.
Best of luck!
Wendy Schmidt
I completely agree. Though I didn’t spell it out as you have done here, this what I was getting at with “no such thing as perfection”. Capitalism is a beast and choosing not to feed the beast is rare for sure. I don’t anticipate finding perfection, but I hope to find better.
I appreciate your comments and what you have shared Austin. Thanks for filling us all in. This is good to know about Substack. I appreciate the information. I too was unfortunately oblivious to the concerns that you mentioned and described. Thanks for all that you do. Best wishes moving forward. I will look out for where you land.
Thank you for your update and level of clarity. I wish you much success. I will continue to follow you Austin Channing Brown! Appreciate you very much
I support you and will follow you. It saddens me to think about how Substack has evolved. I just started publishing here.
Thank you for bringing us along with you. You don't owe anyone explanations, but I love understanding your process and priorities. Can't wait to follow on this next adventure.