Today, this newsletter hit $10,000 in annual revenue.
This is a HUGE milestone, and a big step towards my ultimate goal of having this Substack pay my bills and give me a sense of financial security. I love freelancing but the money is feast and famine (mostly famine, if we're being honest) and having a source of steady income is lifesaving. I'm very close to being able to cover my rent with the revenue from this Substack and about 1/3rd of the way towards the amount of money Costa Rica requires for a digital nomad visa. Just thinking about that a lot lately for no particular reason.
If you are one of the people who makes this possible, from the bottom of my heart: thank you. Your support makes the difference between needing a part-time job to support myself and being able to do this stuff full-time. I don't have words to express how much it means to me.
(A lot of people can't afford to subscribe to stuff and/or don't want to subscribe to a billion different newsletters in this exceedingly silly post-Internet media economy, all of which is extremely understandable. There are a lot of great newsletters I'm a free subscriber to because I just can't swing it right now. This sort of thing is never intended as a guilt trip. Thank you for being here)
I will confess: my reaction to Substack’s cheerful congratulatory email this morning came a bit tinged with guilt. When I monetized this newsletter, I offered a Discord server as a perk. In my defense, I said I might flake on it when I launched it…and wow have I ever, and in record time too. The most anxiety-inducing everyday thing in my life, with no close seconds, is answering emails and text messages (from anyone, about anything). I don't know why I thought Discord was gonna somehow be exempt for this neurosis, but it was not.
Time to stop lying to you and to myself. The Discord stays up, but I can't call it a perk when I'm never there. Instead, I'm pivoting to a monthly live AMA, which I will NOT flake on, because it plays into my character flaws in a more positive way: I have an insatiable craving for attention and love extemporaneously talking into a microphone.
The inaugural AMA will take place on Thursday, April 3rd, at 8:30 PM ET, and be uploaded for viewing afterwards. I recognize that's super early for the West Coast people and unpleasantly late for East Coast folks who get up early for work, but this country is simply too large for any time to be ideal so here we are.
This first AMA will be open to everyone — consider it a free preview. Premium subscribers will get priority on questions (though everyone is invited to ask stuff!). Future AMAs will be a premium perk.
If you have a question, please send it as a reply to this email — or, if you'd rather ask anonymously, feel free to ask on NGL.
Thank you again for being here. I still can't believe I get to write for a living.
I can't speak for others, and I don't think it even applies to me because I can't pay you yet, but I felt nothing but excited relief reading there'd be an AMA rather than discord action. Probably depends on the median age of your subscribers and I'm not hating on discord exactly, it's just very much not intuitive for me to use and so I don't unless I absolutely must.
I think your milestone is a good indicator that you aren't alienating many readers because of lack of discord engagement. Congratulations! Love to see writers I admire getting closer to stability from their hard work.
Congrats a million times! So happy that you have this support and grateful to be able to help in a very small way. As a late, great, activist mentor of mine used to say - You are one of the good ones.