A quick note on subscriptions
and why lots of people are choosing this place as a home for their writing
Note from Nov. 2023: The below subscriptions post was written when I first set this up, in 2022.
As a true representation of my thoughts on subscriptions at the time, and in the year since, I want to keep it as is.
Please do read it, but keep in mind a recent update: I’ve activated the option for paid subscriptions from this month.
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Initially, it was a peace of mind measure - as time went by, some writing I ended up doing here was unexpectedly personal and exposing enough for me to feel uneasy over time about not having at least the option for a barrier between it and the abyss of the internet at large. I couldn’t figure out another way to create that barrier, so I started experimenting with putting certain pieces on ‘private’, ie: available to read with a paid subscription.
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Further to this reasoning, over time, I’ve come to acknowledge the huge amount of work that goes into writing, creating and sharing that publicly, especially doing so with regularity. The hidden costs, and the toll they take, are well and truly hidden. It is very easy for it all to add up in such a way that many will just stop writing and sharing.
As with any craft, it is also impossible to progress without some sort of investment or support. To that end, this is an assurance that any paid subscriptions will go towards contributing to the improvement of a craft, and to the ability to keep sharing that craft, and those improvements, with others.
Because a paid subscription is certainly a commitment, and perhaps a commitment too far at the moment, I’m including here an option for one-off / sporadic donations along the lines of the ‘buy me a coffee’ trend, for those who might like to offer support in that way.
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Below, you will find words / parsing / reasoning from a 2022, just starting out me.
Substack is growing in popularity (although I think it’s been fairly ubiquitous across both the Atlantic Ocean and the Irish Sea for a while, it’s only now tentatively emerging in Ireland) as it provides writers not just an outlet for their writing, but the opportunity to work towards having at least one avenue of relatively stable income through encouraging reader-supported publications, ie: alongside the default option of signing up for free posts, there is an option for the reader to pay a monthly or yearly subscription in order to support their favourite writer to be able to (you guessed it) keep writing.
I’m grateful for this place as a painless to manage once you’ve sussed out all the tech-y stuff home for some writing, and the opportunity for connection and community that might stem from that writing - it’s something I’ve long hoped to create.
I know the invitation to subscribe to yet another anything can be a bit off-putting. There are already plenty of emails to contend with in our days and weeks. It seems like no big deal to sign up to each new interesting thing, until the day comes when you’ve ignored the ever-growing list for too long (optional: fly into a rage that feels disproportionate but that has silently been building in the background each time you open your email), delete everything that doesn’t look important, and begin a campaign of methodically unsubscribing for good measure.
So, I just want to say: I post infrequently enough that I don’t think you’ll feel bombarded, but frequently enough that I think you’ll look forward to hearing from me. It might even be a nice surprise to see an unexpected email pop up about things like translated songs about swallows or seasonal pics and rambles.
If you like the sound of all this but don’t necessarily want to subscribe for that very fair enough reason of overwhelm, might I suggest that you bookmark me, or leave me open as a tab to check in on periodically? Maybe you can write to me and let me know if that’s what you end up doing - I’d be interested to know that I have readers other than those devil may care subscribers.
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If you do choose to subscribe, thank you thank you thank you for the interest. The way I’m choosing to run this thing, the way I’m most comfortable with: all posts will be un-paywalled (real and definitely not made-up words are just some of the joy you’ll find here).
I can’t quite get there with the thought of activating the option for readers to upgrade to a paid subscription - I just wanted a place to create, to share, to write, to practice.
My compromise: if you feel you would like to make some sort of offering (weird wording - makes it sound like a blood sacrifice), some tangible gesture to let me know that you see value here, that I’m creating something you’re glad exists, that you’ve utilised or that has benefited you in some way - here’s an option along the lines of the whole “offer to buy me a coffee” trend. If something has resonated, and you might like to work together on something - I would love that, too, and am more than open to ideas.
What’s also helpful, something that anyone can offer, is interaction with the writing, with the ideas, words of encouragement, even sharing this page with the people in your life who might also like it here. It’s never lost on me what a token of trust it is to invite someone else's words into your day. To know your words mean something to someone can be enough to keep you going in those moments of writerly, and just general humanly, doubt.
I hope you enjoy reading these reflections as much as I enjoy writing and sharing them with you.
Please also enjoy this real life footage of me that somehow made its way on to the internet without my knowledge (really, it’s because I have no idea how to create a thumbnail for this post other than just adding a picture in the text of the piece, and I can’t have no thumbnail. This picture was, for some reason, on my desktop.)