I actually think the quality and originality of my journalism and commentary has improved in recent months compared to when I started this Substack. This is because I never stop doing research or thinking about the topics I write about. I think I am now connecting more dots and writing more important pieces than I was when I started this newsletter.
The astute Reader Comments I read every day have also enhanced my education and thinking.
I just noted this article has already got me one new annual paid subscriber. It occurs to me if every article I wrote produced just two new paid subscribers ... and if I wrote 20 articles a month, this would produce 40 new paid subscribers a month. This, in turn, would translate to approximately $2,000 gross revenue/month. If 90 percent of my current monthly subscribers renew or stay with me, I'd probably have plenty of cash flow to support our family (including my wife's teacher's salary).
I currently have 5,550 total subscribers of which 273 are paid. This means about 5,280 of my subscribers are not "paid." I therefore need to convince just 1 in 2,640 of my non-paid subscribers to become paid subscribers with every article.
In one sense, that doesn't seem that implausible or impossible. That's going to be my new goal!
You write very well, Bill! THAT'S not the problem!
The problem (from my viewpoint) is that the world is changing at such a rapid speed that there is a reluctance to financially commit. As we know from these past few years tomorrow is never promised. Inflation, corruption, AI, rotting infrastructure, etc. take a toll on our wallet.
Substack is so very important during these uncertain times. I wish I was in a position to support the work. I'm not. But I don't know what I would do without the platform...
You are a free subscriber and your comments are great so don't worry about it. Real inflation is what's keeping most Substack authors from getting more paid subscribers. Our officials also lie about the inflation statistics. If inflation was as low as they say, more people would be able to afford a few Substack subscriptions.
You write because you are driven to write. Don't run your talent by the money metric...you will ALWAYS lose and a bit of your soul will be lost as well...
I'm with you. But, actually, I can't keep writing if I don't make a certain amount of income. I have an 8-year-old, 12-year-old and a wife I'm supposed to be supporting.
I'd go get a job at a MSM newspaper, but they'll never hire me.
... I can give an example of how my thinking has evolved since I started this newsletter. For many months, I wrote that the "most important thing" to the world's real rulers was rolling out the new mRNA "vaccines." I still think this was one of their main objectives. However, I now believe the "most important thing" was increasing censorship and stifling debate of all the potentially-influential voices who could scuttle all the agendas of our rulers.
If this modified theory is correct, it follows that suppressing the influence of contrarian writers on Substack would be a priority, especially since there's so much evidence that Substack authors are having some success challenging/debunking bogus narratives.
In my opinion, our rulers want to do a lot more than getting more citizens vaccinated. I also think their main goal is to prevent anyone from coming after THEM. Above all else, our rulers are determined to remain in power and achieve even greater control over our lives. More censorship is the key to that operation.
In other words, the "Deadly Pandemic Covid-19" was just an excuse/justification to ramp up the Censorship Industrial Complex and silence and intimidate the real threat to their continued power, the skeptics.
In my last subscription drive article, I think I mentioned the fact that an average salaried journalist at a legacy/captured mainstream media news organization must make at least $55,000/year (plus benefits). Journalists don't get paid much, but they still get paid many times more than even the most successful Substack authors who are trying to debunk their propaganda.
But, this point made, I know every mainstream journalist these days must be worried to death about losing their jobs because they know their industry is "Dead Man Walking" and they've seen all the pink slips their former colleagues have gotten in recent years.
Perversely, this probably makes the few remaining journalists more eager to write BS to protect the corrupt establishment ... because they KNOW if they don't do this they are going to instantly lose their job ... and they know they won't be able to get another one in that field.
So the mainstream journalists have even a greater incentive to write stories that protect the authorized narratives (and not go against the "pack" or "herd").
It's pretty surreal watching the growing gap between what we see in legacy media and what is reported here, with Substack being the front line in the battle between open honest reporting and the lies and propaganda most people still believe. Of course Substack is under attack, in every way imaginable, from the obvious ones like slandering and misrepresentation in legacy media or trolls posting on the platform to the less obvious ones like putting writers here with the globalist narrative and perhaps even using the platform to launder money or to pay people to post what they want posted. I wonder how a massive influx of cash from their coffers will affect how things work around here. I created my concept of coincidism and set up my Substack a while back but am just now getting up to speed due to some serious health issues. I may try to monetize here at some point, but for now I'm just trying to help save freedom of speech. I hope and pray this platform will not only survive these attacks, but that it will thrive and EXPLODE into everyone's lives all over the globe. Thanks, Bill, and every other writer here who is doing their part to use and to protect and to grow freedom of speech and expression. Long live freedom of speech!
Bill, Many of us with beaucoup subscriptions primarily use the Substack inbox to manage our stack activity. Sometimes I'll see something in email that is so compelling that I will open it there, but for writers like you (or Simulation Commander who responded already) that I will ALWAYS read, I essentially wait for "Substack time" and read them all from the Substack environment -- I do not know how these factor into "opened" emails, but it is sure to add some complexity to your metrics. As people's use matures, my guess is that many, like yours truly, migrate over to Substack to do the reading activities.
Thanks for that, Dr. K. I actually don't have the Substack ap so I don't know how that works! I don't have an Apple phone and just do all my computer work on a desk top Mac. But I imagine most people get these articles on their devices and I guess those aps let these emails go to some place where you can grab them whenever you want to read them. I did see a notice from Substack that 25 percent of "reads" come form this ap (I think).
Yes, what Dr K said. I adjusted my substack notifications to only be on the app on my apple phone. The email notifications were running in the dozens every day and became a big nuisance so now I have to open the app to see what is new.
How does that work, Charles? You just have, say, 50 articles saved in your Substack file by author name and you just can scroll through and read the ones you want when you have time?
The substack icon on my iPhone shows a number on it indicating how many new articles from authors I’m subscribed to since I last opened the app. If I don’t check it for a while I can have 25-35 new articles showing on the app icon. I open the app and all the unread articles have an orange dot by them and are at the top of the list. Something like that anyway. I was getting the same notifications on my iPhone email and it got out of hand so I found a way to kill the emails in the substack settings and just get the notification on the app.
Sounds like a smart ap. I guess you see the headlines, author names and maybe the sub-headlines. It seems like I have to compete with 25 other articles authors to get you to click on my story ... but that's fine.
It’s not really a competition with other authors so much as a competition with that damn clock on the wall that reminds me that nothing else is getting done while I’m immersed in an abundance of good reading…
And I will admit to a little covid burnout, but it’s still a necessary subject for the people who are still getting the big scam figured out. I will become an avid covid follower once again when the indictments, convictions, and the executions get going.
We're all trying to figure it out. Every big scandal and mystery of Covid still hasn't been definitively exposed. Nobody has been held accountable ... so we can't stop. All the pressure and angles we are attacking the liars and crooks on must be making the Covid Cartel very nervous.
That's why Substack can't be captured. And that's why they probably want to scuttle Substack or at least the writers who are hitting closest to the most important targets.
Bill, You can get similar function on a browser by navigating to substack.com/inbox. Many of use that, too. But it means that many emails do not get read as emails because they are separately read in app or browser inbox.
I never posted my last Subscription Drive results. Here they are:
At the end of February, I had to do an unscheduled emergency subscription drive. I am very happy and grateful to report that this effort netted me 16 new paid subscribers in three days. I also got eight Ko-fi "donations" (including one tip of $100!). This means 23 of my subscribers contributed to my Substack business - which is more than 1 percent of the 1900 or so subscribers who opened that email. That article was read by about 3,900 readers.
One oddity of my subscription drive that also activates my "Spider Sense" is that I actually lost two net subscribers in those three days. I started off with 5,641 total subsribers (free and paid) and ended up with 5,639. Go figure. I guess I lost 25 or so free subscribers (because I also got some free subscribers).
I've since lost two more paid subscribers. This testimonial illustrates how Substack authors are constantly fighting a war of attrition. You lose some, you gain some.
I can say that of my now 272 paid subscribers, the vast majority came in two or three subscription drives. This is bad news for my readers because it looks like I'm going to have to hold these telethons a couple of times a year!
Thank your for everyone who subscribed or bought me some coffee on Ko-fi. Also, thanks to those who share my articles. As today's article shows, that's where I'm getting the majority of my readers and any new reader is a potential future subscriber.
I check and curate my email daily using Linux programming, no apps or cellphone, and no gmail so nothing gets lost.
I subscribe to under 20 stacks and try to support the writers who are raising families who have a modest amount of subscribers - in other words who need the money.
Our income has dramatically decreased in the last 5 years as our property taxes went up 30% since 2020 (!!) For a cozy 1200 square foot log home on a third of an acre.....
I try to kofi and subscribe as I can and you and Dr Malik are on my next list, Bill Rice Jr.
Thank you. Inflation numbers are rigged too. Real inflation is far worse than what the official numbers say. Your property tax increase is an example of this. Thanks for your support!
I wouldn’t put too much importance on the “open rate”. I ignore/turn off/delete substack emails and go straight to the app. No interest in emails at all, but I check all my authors all the time on the app.
FWIW, my open rate has always hovered just a little over 20%. Not sure if this counts people who read on the app or just bookmark the site directly. Haven't seen much movement in either direction for a while.
I don't worry about it too much - my "views" are generally a little over half my subscriptions, and I know a lot of readers navigate to articles in other ways (perhaps a link from another comment section)
I rarely go to the Substack InBox and even more rarely, use the IoS app.
I use a third-party email client (Outlook) for all of my various email accounts. I have it set so that any particular email isn't flipped to 'Read' just because I stopped on it to read the title/short blurb. In other words, I have to explicitly flag an email as 'Read'. Most of the time, for Substack subscriptions, I'll always flip the switch before deleting the email from the queue. Sometimes I don't, especially those Stacks I subscribe to that often have pay-walled articles, then I just delete the mail.
What I'm wondering, via a third-party email client, are 'open' rates affected? And, for folks using say, Gmail, Yahoo, Thunderbird etc, who might click to go to the web based artcle, but then delete the email, 'unread'...are open rate metrics affected?
With all due respect, I must admit, I’m over subscribed. As it is, I spend about 6 hours a day on line… the good news is that now it’s about 30 minutes on FB, Instagram… the bulk is on Substack… I have 12 free Substacks and only read a few of those regularly… I have mentioned to “you all” , that I go for days without email notifications that you have posted a new Substack… they randomly show up in my Junk folder, ( which I often forget about) , not regularly in my new mail… so, I don’t know if it’s Google messing with all of Substack or just you troublemakers…. But I’ve sensed there is some sort of manipulation going on. I know for certain that Matt Taibbi’s Racket material is all going into my junk file.. and I believe Taibbi, Screaming , Public and you Bill are the only ones I pay for “ annually”…my Subs I pay for monthly are the most MIA.. like Gato. I went three weeks without any email notification on hiss/her Sunday gems….. I’m sorry this is happening.
This is the type of reader intelligence I was looking for, Mrs. McFarland. Thanks for sharing - I think "something" fishy IS going on ... And thanks for me being your one annual sub. I'm flattered!
Thank you very much. I agree there's too many good articles out there to read all of them. If you can just read my stuff from time to time - and stop by and make a few comments when you have something to say - that will make my day!
I subscribe and email is helpful since substack s can get lost in the shuffle. I combine cleaning up my mail box with reading articles I may have missed on Subs.
I free subscribed when someone else restocked or when you made a good comment somewhere else with a link to a stack article you wrote on same topic.
I can only afford 2-3 paid subscriptions, and sadly am therefore blocked from so many that I would love to read. However I occasionally make a “coffee” donation to one or another if I realize I am reading the author often.
That is not to say you should not be paying attention to numbers. That’s how people finally figured Twitter had been censoring.
Thanks for your hard work.
I never get tired of new info on cov damage, and who dunnits etc if it has credible links to back it up, so I can pass along to fence sitters and people who truly (still) are clueless.
I forgot. Substack might be banned in Canada soon on account of the new hateful hate bill that's about to be passed in the legislature. Given its provisions, it's at least going to put a big chill on the Canuck writers, as hate speech (you know, anything Der Furhrer doesn't like) is punished by life imprisonment. With an ex post facto clause, to boot - though I think that part will be stricken down.
Substack will be banned in Australia if this bill goes through. Also, if an Emergency is declared we may be disappeared and taken to camps and speaking out about it will be called 'misinformation.' I wish I was fear mongering but all the Acts and bills are here: https://vicparkpetition.substack.com/p/the-australian-government-may-legally
Edit: I also forgot to say we may also be injected by force and all these things are legal.
I have always paid keen attention to your reports on what's happening in Australia, which are beyond scary. Canada is similar, but I think Australia might be the "canary in the coal mine" that's sending us the scariest warning.
It was possible during the covid state of emergency to inject us by force under the WA Health Act 2016. The only reason why they did not was the incredible threat of defensive [redacted] by people who had nothing left to lose.
Also at that point they had lost 50% of the police force who were at home watching.
Notice they're trying to push it as a bill 'to protect children'. I mean, listening to them talk you'd think child pornography is legal in Canada. It isn't. But I wonder how many people will fall for it?
Is there anywhere left we can run away to? (rhetorical question).
Another scary anecdote from a citizen correspondent in the Substack Reader Comments sections.
I've asked your question about where could someone seeking a little real freedom flee?
Maybe Argentia if that country's new president can keep doing what he's doing? It seems that Asian countries like Thailand and Vietnam might have more economic freedom and a much lower cost of living?
We hear a lot about the illegal immigrants flooding into America from Mexico ... but some Americans are going the other way ... and settling in Mexico! I think it's too late for me to learn Spanish, but maybe I need to.
Prediction: In the future many more Americans will seriously consider this question ... where can we move our family?
I initially had high hopes for Miliei, but when he tied Argentina to the USD and immediately cracked down on individual freedoms ('prison or bullet') the second he got into office I knew he was compromised. He is not pro-liberty. See: https://actionabletruth.substack.com/p/the-truth-about-controlled-opposition
(And before people start getting wound up, the author of this linked Substack above is an Israeli Jew, former IDF soldier and Australian. His Substack is excellent).
Countries in Africa have been doing this for years, and Nigeria is in chaos from the eNaira system. The government has been destroying paper notes to 'fight corruption' but it's just forcing people to digital currency and kidnappings have increased (personal testimony from ministry friend).
You have to remember that Substack expanded rapidly with many good writers with something interesting to say. I want to read many, but I simply cannot keep up, despite my best efforts. I even cut out activities that I love, just to try and keep up. I appreciate writers who don't post daily!
I use an RSS reader to catch new substack publications, other blogs, news letters....
I have never successfully turned off e-mail notices from substack, and so generally do not subscribe to all of the substacks in my RSS,(currently over 100) as that would gag my email.
As a result, I will have a 0 opens from e-mail. I would be one of the readers that did not come from an email.
Thanks. These reports are helping educate me about my readership data/metrics. Maybe they aren't as alarming as I thought. Still, there has been a sudden change in a couple of months. That always makes me wonder what's going on. What changed?
That's one of my main take-aways from my on-going analysis of "Subtack author key metrics."
IMO this does not bode well for the future of Substack .... which is NOT a good sign for the "freedom movement" or for those authors who are challenging dubious narratives. Or citizens/readers who are interested in more people doing real journalism or providing skeptical commentary.
Being an old-timer I find myself comparing my Substack costs to previous subscriptions I had for decades with MSM publications like NYT or WSJ. At $5/mo and only reading one author it is only prudent for most people, myself included to, to subscribe to only a handful or less of authors. Is it possible to have a lower subscription rate? ICBW, but I'm thinking that with a lower rate, say $2/mo e.g., that a lot more people would be paid subscribing to a larger number of authors which would help to support the market for the large number of very good writers.
I hear that suggestion often. My billlion-dollar idea is "Nickel Reads." It WOULD be a billion-dollar business if people would pay a nickel for articles they really like. About Covid or about auto mechanics tips or Taylor Swift or whatever topic people care about.
I subscribe to a lot of writers, too. Several times a day I check subject lines in email and either tag to read later, or open and save and read on the Substack platform. Only a few email messages get deleted since I always think I'll read something later . . . . (probably not a good strategy over all, but the tags do often help me find the occasional gem later on).
If your open rate has dropped slightly, my guess is it may be the competition-for-attention factor. Since more and more people are moving onto Substack now, the temptation to subscribe to more and more authors remains strong (at least for me). I really have to discipline myself by unsubscribing occasionally from those newsletters I don't get around to reading ~ or who are no longer focusing on my primary interests: C-19, medical freedom, censorship and freedom of speech.
I appreciate your articles on this topic, Bill, as I agree it is very important. A couple of things from my point of view: 1) I use the Substack app, but it changed its appearance not too long ago and requires a lot more scrolling in order to see what articles have appeared from authors I subscribe to. 2) On the other hand, my proton email account records all the new articles from the Substack authors I subscribe to, so I can easily see what articles are new and whether the headline sounds important to me. I subscribe to a lot of authors and some I have only read once or twice. You are one of the few I read regularly.3) I do think that Substack's popularity is directly related to the degree of censorship and the sharpening of the class struggle. The Covid Op was an extreme example of this and now as it is waning somewhat, I'm not surprised if readership is temporarily slowing down, plateauing, or even decreases for a while. As the next attack takes place it will increase again, perhaps at an even greater rate.
I was just sharing some emails with Mark Oshinskie on this subject. I think the biggest stories in the world might not have happened yet and might be right around the corner. Also, the mainstream media is Dead Man Walking. When those next seismic events happen, the public is going to be looking somewhere else besides the NY Times or their local newspaper. I think many more people could discover Substack in the next 12 to 24 months. If so, I'm glad I already have a presence on the platform.
TPTB will try to do whatever it takes to keep the intellectual public's eyes on their content. IMO Tucker Carlson is the perfect example of this. Carlson, son of the former CEO of Voice of America and other US intelligence services, as well as an heir to the Swanson frozen food fortune, is an Anderson Cooper look-alike, except that he would never have a following if he continued on Fox. As a "rebel" he can still retain the eyes of skeptical, yet naive, people around the world. The Putin interview was the biggest media event perhaps of this century. TPTB were forced to abandon their old MSM news outlets and replace them with sites like Carlson. Hopefully people will see through him and begin looking for alternatives, thereby finding the honest truthseekers that populate Substack. The lies and contradictions in the mainstream narrative are becoming so obvious that the controlled opposition like Carlson are not able to sweep it away.
I watch most of Tucker's news segments and must say I think "hear! hear!" when I hear 95 percent of his monologues or interviews with his maverick guests. If I was in his place, I'd produce the exact same type segments.
So if I replaced Substack would someone say I was captured or controlled opposition? Probably so, but I wouldn't be. Even when we get a rare truth-teller, significant numbers of the "freedom movement" are certain this person is working for the other side.
It's not 3-D chess, but 4-D chess to have someone like Tucker Carlson lampooning or harpooning some bogus narratives - narratives he really doesn't believe in.
I can confirm most of the conclusion from my readers perspective. First, there is many more channels which pop-up and people migrated. It´s Telegram, Brownstone, X, TheEpochTimes, EpochTV, UKColumn, Rumble, ZeroHedge, Expose News, WeebUnion, Vigilant News, NCI, Children's Health Defense, Corona Ausschuss, Geopolitics and Empire, Tucker Carlson, The Daily Sceptic and others. Before it was only SubStack as other platforms were not really developed yet. Also Brave Search and others allow now more content to be found on internet by default and also now we can communicate via old platforms with non-brainwashed people, so the discussion is going back and it takes a lot of time and energy.
Second is that I and probably many people have changed e-mail provider and started to remove the e-mail notifications. It´s just too many of them, so I don´t get anymore SubStack notification. The crisis is over and information overload is real. So there is need to reduce it.
Lastly, the covid is already over, now most people don´t read news but digging back into archives what really happened in last 4 years as they couldn´t access it or read it because of censorship.
I think also many people reduce their exposure to online-content and for example I have now invested in separated CD, DVD and old books from 2000. Also new Books like The Wuhan Cover-Up and I don´t really look for new content as 90% has been already said and there is nothing new, which interest me. I am only curious now how the past will be handled and the evidence is overwhelming. For anyone outside of this group, it´s enough just to share post from 2021 and everything is already there - there is so many information's, that it´s not possible to even go back and read all of this.
Also Substack shows now feed like on Twitter and basically you see mostly 10 new articles, it´s more question now to select from them and to filter the most relevant. It´s not possible to catch-up with all of the content now, as the censorship has fallen so broadly and many people are coming to understand what happened.
For me I am trying to stay updated on Substack with Coffee & Covid 2024 (https://www.coffeeandcovid.com/), Brownstone (X), The Neo-Ciceronian Times, Dr. Naomi Wolf, C.J.Hopkins, Vigilant News, The FLCCC Alliance Community, WeebUnion (Ukraine War), Toby Rogers and others but it´s already too much, just to see the new articles. I also like Telegram and X now.
I work at home and, when I'm not writing my own articles, I'm reading the articles of other people (and digging through some complex studies). But I consider this research. All these articles - and the Reader Comments - help crystalize and refine my thinking and allow me, I hope, to connect some more dots ... which will make my next articles more valuable or original.
I also make many comments at other sites, which helps market my own Substack and maybe increases my Substack "brand."
But I'm definitely atypical. Anyone with a real job can't read this number of articles. I do think there's a fair percentage of people who read two or three hours/day. I know we have cut the cord (to save on our cable bill). Time I used to spend watching TV, I now spend reading on the Internet. People who read, say, one hour/day are probably my best target market. This is probably millions of people world-wide.
You are right, it´s good but now I think it´s kind of retrospective phase with evaluating who were right and what was correct. Also economy is open again, so there is a lot of normal work, that can have also huge impact.
Just to give example - writer named THEOPHILUS CHILTON who writes The Neo-Ciceronian Times currently publish mostly articles he wrote in 2016 about the situation and what´s happening. When you just repost the article and read it now - after covid and lockdown, it´s incredibly precise and even more incredible, he saw it long time before.
SubStack is good but the covid investigation has been now so wide spread, that if the new articles are not something like "Fauci is in prison" or "FBI and CIA buildings are set to fire by angry crowd" there is not much news, which could be interesting anymore. The real news is now how will be dealt with this treason and what will people do. Maybe they will do nothing and we will just move on, who knows...
Still, I do support any work, which tries to put light on this! So keep up good work! And don´t be sad if the numbers will be lower as the spring and summer is coming. I am also now going to take vacation and screw this crazy fanatics, life is good 🌷🤗
I actually think the quality and originality of my journalism and commentary has improved in recent months compared to when I started this Substack. This is because I never stop doing research or thinking about the topics I write about. I think I am now connecting more dots and writing more important pieces than I was when I started this newsletter.
The astute Reader Comments I read every day have also enhanced my education and thinking.
I just noted this article has already got me one new annual paid subscriber. It occurs to me if every article I wrote produced just two new paid subscribers ... and if I wrote 20 articles a month, this would produce 40 new paid subscribers a month. This, in turn, would translate to approximately $2,000 gross revenue/month. If 90 percent of my current monthly subscribers renew or stay with me, I'd probably have plenty of cash flow to support our family (including my wife's teacher's salary).
I currently have 5,550 total subscribers of which 273 are paid. This means about 5,280 of my subscribers are not "paid." I therefore need to convince just 1 in 2,640 of my non-paid subscribers to become paid subscribers with every article.
In one sense, that doesn't seem that implausible or impossible. That's going to be my new goal!
You write very well, Bill! THAT'S not the problem!
The problem (from my viewpoint) is that the world is changing at such a rapid speed that there is a reluctance to financially commit. As we know from these past few years tomorrow is never promised. Inflation, corruption, AI, rotting infrastructure, etc. take a toll on our wallet.
Substack is so very important during these uncertain times. I wish I was in a position to support the work. I'm not. But I don't know what I would do without the platform...
You are a free subscriber and your comments are great so don't worry about it. Real inflation is what's keeping most Substack authors from getting more paid subscribers. Our officials also lie about the inflation statistics. If inflation was as low as they say, more people would be able to afford a few Substack subscriptions.
Thanks for understanding!
You write because you are driven to write. Don't run your talent by the money metric...you will ALWAYS lose and a bit of your soul will be lost as well...
I'm with you. But, actually, I can't keep writing if I don't make a certain amount of income. I have an 8-year-old, 12-year-old and a wife I'm supposed to be supporting.
I'd go get a job at a MSM newspaper, but they'll never hire me.
... I can give an example of how my thinking has evolved since I started this newsletter. For many months, I wrote that the "most important thing" to the world's real rulers was rolling out the new mRNA "vaccines." I still think this was one of their main objectives. However, I now believe the "most important thing" was increasing censorship and stifling debate of all the potentially-influential voices who could scuttle all the agendas of our rulers.
If this modified theory is correct, it follows that suppressing the influence of contrarian writers on Substack would be a priority, especially since there's so much evidence that Substack authors are having some success challenging/debunking bogus narratives.
In my opinion, our rulers want to do a lot more than getting more citizens vaccinated. I also think their main goal is to prevent anyone from coming after THEM. Above all else, our rulers are determined to remain in power and achieve even greater control over our lives. More censorship is the key to that operation.
In other words, the "Deadly Pandemic Covid-19" was just an excuse/justification to ramp up the Censorship Industrial Complex and silence and intimidate the real threat to their continued power, the skeptics.
Read Katherine Watt's substack on how it's been baked into laws for decades:
https://bailiwicknews.substack.com/p/orientation-for-new-readers
Dr. David Martin can show you all the patent history and plan for misdeeds is in the WHO charter:
'Criminal Cartel': The World Health Organization
https://www.bitchute.com/video/XvD6vMOvjOHr/
In my last subscription drive article, I think I mentioned the fact that an average salaried journalist at a legacy/captured mainstream media news organization must make at least $55,000/year (plus benefits). Journalists don't get paid much, but they still get paid many times more than even the most successful Substack authors who are trying to debunk their propaganda.
But, this point made, I know every mainstream journalist these days must be worried to death about losing their jobs because they know their industry is "Dead Man Walking" and they've seen all the pink slips their former colleagues have gotten in recent years.
Perversely, this probably makes the few remaining journalists more eager to write BS to protect the corrupt establishment ... because they KNOW if they don't do this they are going to instantly lose their job ... and they know they won't be able to get another one in that field.
So the mainstream journalists have even a greater incentive to write stories that protect the authorized narratives (and not go against the "pack" or "herd").
It's pretty surreal watching the growing gap between what we see in legacy media and what is reported here, with Substack being the front line in the battle between open honest reporting and the lies and propaganda most people still believe. Of course Substack is under attack, in every way imaginable, from the obvious ones like slandering and misrepresentation in legacy media or trolls posting on the platform to the less obvious ones like putting writers here with the globalist narrative and perhaps even using the platform to launder money or to pay people to post what they want posted. I wonder how a massive influx of cash from their coffers will affect how things work around here. I created my concept of coincidism and set up my Substack a while back but am just now getting up to speed due to some serious health issues. I may try to monetize here at some point, but for now I'm just trying to help save freedom of speech. I hope and pray this platform will not only survive these attacks, but that it will thrive and EXPLODE into everyone's lives all over the globe. Thanks, Bill, and every other writer here who is doing their part to use and to protect and to grow freedom of speech and expression. Long live freedom of speech!
Good luck with your Substack, Mark. You can plug your articles here whenever you want.
Bill, Many of us with beaucoup subscriptions primarily use the Substack inbox to manage our stack activity. Sometimes I'll see something in email that is so compelling that I will open it there, but for writers like you (or Simulation Commander who responded already) that I will ALWAYS read, I essentially wait for "Substack time" and read them all from the Substack environment -- I do not know how these factor into "opened" emails, but it is sure to add some complexity to your metrics. As people's use matures, my guess is that many, like yours truly, migrate over to Substack to do the reading activities.
Just another angle.
Thanks for that, Dr. K. I actually don't have the Substack ap so I don't know how that works! I don't have an Apple phone and just do all my computer work on a desk top Mac. But I imagine most people get these articles on their devices and I guess those aps let these emails go to some place where you can grab them whenever you want to read them. I did see a notice from Substack that 25 percent of "reads" come form this ap (I think).
Yes, what Dr K said. I adjusted my substack notifications to only be on the app on my apple phone. The email notifications were running in the dozens every day and became a big nuisance so now I have to open the app to see what is new.
How does that work, Charles? You just have, say, 50 articles saved in your Substack file by author name and you just can scroll through and read the ones you want when you have time?
The substack icon on my iPhone shows a number on it indicating how many new articles from authors I’m subscribed to since I last opened the app. If I don’t check it for a while I can have 25-35 new articles showing on the app icon. I open the app and all the unread articles have an orange dot by them and are at the top of the list. Something like that anyway. I was getting the same notifications on my iPhone email and it got out of hand so I found a way to kill the emails in the substack settings and just get the notification on the app.
Sounds like a smart ap. I guess you see the headlines, author names and maybe the sub-headlines. It seems like I have to compete with 25 other articles authors to get you to click on my story ... but that's fine.
It’s not really a competition with other authors so much as a competition with that damn clock on the wall that reminds me that nothing else is getting done while I’m immersed in an abundance of good reading…
And I will admit to a little covid burnout, but it’s still a necessary subject for the people who are still getting the big scam figured out. I will become an avid covid follower once again when the indictments, convictions, and the executions get going.
We're all trying to figure it out. Every big scandal and mystery of Covid still hasn't been definitively exposed. Nobody has been held accountable ... so we can't stop. All the pressure and angles we are attacking the liars and crooks on must be making the Covid Cartel very nervous.
That's why Substack can't be captured. And that's why they probably want to scuttle Substack or at least the writers who are hitting closest to the most important targets.
This is what I have done. Too many emails. I just open the app daily.
You must have opened this article on your app ... gracias!
Bill, You can get similar function on a browser by navigating to substack.com/inbox. Many of use that, too. But it means that many emails do not get read as emails because they are separately read in app or browser inbox.
I rarely read my email notifications/newsletters from substack writers. I do “substack” time in the AM.
He’s got a good point.
I never posted my last Subscription Drive results. Here they are:
At the end of February, I had to do an unscheduled emergency subscription drive. I am very happy and grateful to report that this effort netted me 16 new paid subscribers in three days. I also got eight Ko-fi "donations" (including one tip of $100!). This means 23 of my subscribers contributed to my Substack business - which is more than 1 percent of the 1900 or so subscribers who opened that email. That article was read by about 3,900 readers.
One oddity of my subscription drive that also activates my "Spider Sense" is that I actually lost two net subscribers in those three days. I started off with 5,641 total subsribers (free and paid) and ended up with 5,639. Go figure. I guess I lost 25 or so free subscribers (because I also got some free subscribers).
I've since lost two more paid subscribers. This testimonial illustrates how Substack authors are constantly fighting a war of attrition. You lose some, you gain some.
I can say that of my now 272 paid subscribers, the vast majority came in two or three subscription drives. This is bad news for my readers because it looks like I'm going to have to hold these telethons a couple of times a year!
Thank your for everyone who subscribed or bought me some coffee on Ko-fi. Also, thanks to those who share my articles. As today's article shows, that's where I'm getting the majority of my readers and any new reader is a potential future subscriber.
I hope you liked your $100 coffee. I thought you deserved a White Mocha Frappuccino!!
👏👏👏
The real MVP! Thank you fo supporting grassroots journalists!
Writing in to defend email!
I check and curate my email daily using Linux programming, no apps or cellphone, and no gmail so nothing gets lost.
I subscribe to under 20 stacks and try to support the writers who are raising families who have a modest amount of subscribers - in other words who need the money.
Our income has dramatically decreased in the last 5 years as our property taxes went up 30% since 2020 (!!) For a cozy 1200 square foot log home on a third of an acre.....
I try to kofi and subscribe as I can and you and Dr Malik are on my next list, Bill Rice Jr.
You are one of the few writers I really value.
Thank you. Inflation numbers are rigged too. Real inflation is far worse than what the official numbers say. Your property tax increase is an example of this. Thanks for your support!
I wouldn’t put too much importance on the “open rate”. I ignore/turn off/delete substack emails and go straight to the app. No interest in emails at all, but I check all my authors all the time on the app.
That makes me feel better. So I guess the key for someone like me is to have a newsletter where readers will check out your stories via the ap.
I still don't know if the "Open rate" is capturing people who get their articles via their ap.
FWIW, my open rate has always hovered just a little over 20%. Not sure if this counts people who read on the app or just bookmark the site directly. Haven't seen much movement in either direction for a while.
Thanks, Commander. I thought yours would be much higher. You do really well with Reader Comments and "likes," which are two other Substack metrics.
I don't worry about it too much - my "views" are generally a little over half my subscriptions, and I know a lot of readers navigate to articles in other ways (perhaps a link from another comment section)
"Views" as a percentage of total subscriptions is a good metric. I do pretty good with that one.
I rarely go to the Substack InBox and even more rarely, use the IoS app.
I use a third-party email client (Outlook) for all of my various email accounts. I have it set so that any particular email isn't flipped to 'Read' just because I stopped on it to read the title/short blurb. In other words, I have to explicitly flag an email as 'Read'. Most of the time, for Substack subscriptions, I'll always flip the switch before deleting the email from the queue. Sometimes I don't, especially those Stacks I subscribe to that often have pay-walled articles, then I just delete the mail.
What I'm wondering, via a third-party email client, are 'open' rates affected? And, for folks using say, Gmail, Yahoo, Thunderbird etc, who might click to go to the web based artcle, but then delete the email, 'unread'...are open rate metrics affected?
Mine is about 40%.
However, I have no social media because I am banned from all platforms and some articles are undeliverable on Australian telco carriers.
So, email is really the only place I am not censored.
SimCom just in case you haven't seen my other comment, three letter agencies can run Substack accounts according to the AI assistant. Scroll to end of article: https://vicparkpetition.substack.com/p/february-2024-substack-muster-and
With all due respect, I must admit, I’m over subscribed. As it is, I spend about 6 hours a day on line… the good news is that now it’s about 30 minutes on FB, Instagram… the bulk is on Substack… I have 12 free Substacks and only read a few of those regularly… I have mentioned to “you all” , that I go for days without email notifications that you have posted a new Substack… they randomly show up in my Junk folder, ( which I often forget about) , not regularly in my new mail… so, I don’t know if it’s Google messing with all of Substack or just you troublemakers…. But I’ve sensed there is some sort of manipulation going on. I know for certain that Matt Taibbi’s Racket material is all going into my junk file.. and I believe Taibbi, Screaming , Public and you Bill are the only ones I pay for “ annually”…my Subs I pay for monthly are the most MIA.. like Gato. I went three weeks without any email notification on hiss/her Sunday gems….. I’m sorry this is happening.
This is the type of reader intelligence I was looking for, Mrs. McFarland. Thanks for sharing - I think "something" fishy IS going on ... And thanks for me being your one annual sub. I'm flattered!
“ hiss”! I’m leaving the typo.
Bill I just recently subscribed. To be honest I’m not going to read every article but want to support what you have to say.
Thank you very much. I agree there's too many good articles out there to read all of them. If you can just read my stuff from time to time - and stop by and make a few comments when you have something to say - that will make my day!
I subscribe and email is helpful since substack s can get lost in the shuffle. I combine cleaning up my mail box with reading articles I may have missed on Subs.
I free subscribed when someone else restocked or when you made a good comment somewhere else with a link to a stack article you wrote on same topic.
I can only afford 2-3 paid subscriptions, and sadly am therefore blocked from so many that I would love to read. However I occasionally make a “coffee” donation to one or another if I realize I am reading the author often.
That is not to say you should not be paying attention to numbers. That’s how people finally figured Twitter had been censoring.
Thanks for your hard work.
I never get tired of new info on cov damage, and who dunnits etc if it has credible links to back it up, so I can pass along to fence sitters and people who truly (still) are clueless.
That’s all we can do!! I know any support is appreciated!
I forgot. Substack might be banned in Canada soon on account of the new hateful hate bill that's about to be passed in the legislature. Given its provisions, it's at least going to put a big chill on the Canuck writers, as hate speech (you know, anything Der Furhrer doesn't like) is punished by life imprisonment. With an ex post facto clause, to boot - though I think that part will be stricken down.
Good times...
Substack will be banned in Australia if this bill goes through. Also, if an Emergency is declared we may be disappeared and taken to camps and speaking out about it will be called 'misinformation.' I wish I was fear mongering but all the Acts and bills are here: https://vicparkpetition.substack.com/p/the-australian-government-may-legally
Edit: I also forgot to say we may also be injected by force and all these things are legal.
I have always paid keen attention to your reports on what's happening in Australia, which are beyond scary. Canada is similar, but I think Australia might be the "canary in the coal mine" that's sending us the scariest warning.
It was possible during the covid state of emergency to inject us by force under the WA Health Act 2016. The only reason why they did not was the incredible threat of defensive [redacted] by people who had nothing left to lose.
Also at that point they had lost 50% of the police force who were at home watching.
Basically: FAFO.
I'd like to think we don't have enough prisons, but here in BC they've been building dozens of gulag. There must be a hundred or more at this point.
The conservatives said they'd fight the bill - yet not a peep from anyone during question period in Parliament since it was tabled.
It will pass. Trudeau’s liberals made an unholy alliance with the NDP (the flat-out communists), and between the two it's an overwhelming majority.
Mathew wrote about it the other day, and linked to the PDF of the proposed law if you want all the gory details
https://mathewaldred.substack.com/p/canadas-bill-c-63-life-imprisonment
Notice they're trying to push it as a bill 'to protect children'. I mean, listening to them talk you'd think child pornography is legal in Canada. It isn't. But I wonder how many people will fall for it?
Is there anywhere left we can run away to? (rhetorical question).
Another scary anecdote from a citizen correspondent in the Substack Reader Comments sections.
I've asked your question about where could someone seeking a little real freedom flee?
Maybe Argentia if that country's new president can keep doing what he's doing? It seems that Asian countries like Thailand and Vietnam might have more economic freedom and a much lower cost of living?
We hear a lot about the illegal immigrants flooding into America from Mexico ... but some Americans are going the other way ... and settling in Mexico! I think it's too late for me to learn Spanish, but maybe I need to.
Prediction: In the future many more Americans will seriously consider this question ... where can we move our family?
There is no where to run.
I initially had high hopes for Miliei, but when he tied Argentina to the USD and immediately cracked down on individual freedoms ('prison or bullet') the second he got into office I knew he was compromised. He is not pro-liberty. See: https://actionabletruth.substack.com/p/the-truth-about-controlled-opposition
(And before people start getting wound up, the author of this linked Substack above is an Israeli Jew, former IDF soldier and Australian. His Substack is excellent).
Now, Vietnam.
Vietnam is a communist country and will soon have biometric information on ID cards: https://www.vietnam.vn/en/cong-an-tp-hcm-noi-ve-bo-sung-du-lieu-sinh-trac-hoc-tren-the-can-cuoc/
They're also adding facial recognition for immigrants: https://www.biometricupdate.com/202402/vietnam-adds-facial-recognition-for-online-immigration-to-digital-transformation-plan
All part of Vietnam's massive digital transformation: https://vietnamnews.vn/economy/1651126/hcm-city-announces-key-tasks-for-digital-transformation.html
Countries in Africa have been doing this for years, and Nigeria is in chaos from the eNaira system. The government has been destroying paper notes to 'fight corruption' but it's just forcing people to digital currency and kidnappings have increased (personal testimony from ministry friend).
So, we stand and fight where we are.
Not sure if you have seen this but there are rules in place for FEMA camps in all 50 US states: https://conspiracysarah.substack.com/p/48-of-50-states-already-have-rules
When is Little Adolf going to get voted out of office??
You have to remember that Substack expanded rapidly with many good writers with something interesting to say. I want to read many, but I simply cannot keep up, despite my best efforts. I even cut out activities that I love, just to try and keep up. I appreciate writers who don't post daily!
I use an RSS reader to catch new substack publications, other blogs, news letters....
I have never successfully turned off e-mail notices from substack, and so generally do not subscribe to all of the substacks in my RSS,(currently over 100) as that would gag my email.
As a result, I will have a 0 opens from e-mail. I would be one of the readers that did not come from an email.
Thanks. These reports are helping educate me about my readership data/metrics. Maybe they aren't as alarming as I thought. Still, there has been a sudden change in a couple of months. That always makes me wonder what's going on. What changed?
Substack has improved the app considerably and made more of a noise promoting it I think
There are so many good writers , not possible to open all, certainly not possible to pay for all! I
That's one of my main take-aways from my on-going analysis of "Subtack author key metrics."
IMO this does not bode well for the future of Substack .... which is NOT a good sign for the "freedom movement" or for those authors who are challenging dubious narratives. Or citizens/readers who are interested in more people doing real journalism or providing skeptical commentary.
Being an old-timer I find myself comparing my Substack costs to previous subscriptions I had for decades with MSM publications like NYT or WSJ. At $5/mo and only reading one author it is only prudent for most people, myself included to, to subscribe to only a handful or less of authors. Is it possible to have a lower subscription rate? ICBW, but I'm thinking that with a lower rate, say $2/mo e.g., that a lot more people would be paid subscribing to a larger number of authors which would help to support the market for the large number of very good writers.
I hear that suggestion often. My billlion-dollar idea is "Nickel Reads." It WOULD be a billion-dollar business if people would pay a nickel for articles they really like. About Covid or about auto mechanics tips or Taylor Swift or whatever topic people care about.
The software already exists for micropayments, so it is in use for _something_.
I subscribe to over 100 stacks. I view all in my email. So, headlines are critically important for getting me to open it.
If i like the piece, I’ll restack it or i might share to my group’s Telegram account, then browse through comments.
If I am not interested in topic, I’ll delete and move on.
I like to keep my in box to 50. Truly, an impossible task. But, substack is my favorite medium — love excellent, uncensored long-form writing.
Thank you for the gift you’re providing during this crazy time.
I subscribe to a lot of writers, too. Several times a day I check subject lines in email and either tag to read later, or open and save and read on the Substack platform. Only a few email messages get deleted since I always think I'll read something later . . . . (probably not a good strategy over all, but the tags do often help me find the occasional gem later on).
If your open rate has dropped slightly, my guess is it may be the competition-for-attention factor. Since more and more people are moving onto Substack now, the temptation to subscribe to more and more authors remains strong (at least for me). I really have to discipline myself by unsubscribing occasionally from those newsletters I don't get around to reading ~ or who are no longer focusing on my primary interests: C-19, medical freedom, censorship and freedom of speech.
I appreciate your articles on this topic, Bill, as I agree it is very important. A couple of things from my point of view: 1) I use the Substack app, but it changed its appearance not too long ago and requires a lot more scrolling in order to see what articles have appeared from authors I subscribe to. 2) On the other hand, my proton email account records all the new articles from the Substack authors I subscribe to, so I can easily see what articles are new and whether the headline sounds important to me. I subscribe to a lot of authors and some I have only read once or twice. You are one of the few I read regularly.3) I do think that Substack's popularity is directly related to the degree of censorship and the sharpening of the class struggle. The Covid Op was an extreme example of this and now as it is waning somewhat, I'm not surprised if readership is temporarily slowing down, plateauing, or even decreases for a while. As the next attack takes place it will increase again, perhaps at an even greater rate.
I was just sharing some emails with Mark Oshinskie on this subject. I think the biggest stories in the world might not have happened yet and might be right around the corner. Also, the mainstream media is Dead Man Walking. When those next seismic events happen, the public is going to be looking somewhere else besides the NY Times or their local newspaper. I think many more people could discover Substack in the next 12 to 24 months. If so, I'm glad I already have a presence on the platform.
TPTB will try to do whatever it takes to keep the intellectual public's eyes on their content. IMO Tucker Carlson is the perfect example of this. Carlson, son of the former CEO of Voice of America and other US intelligence services, as well as an heir to the Swanson frozen food fortune, is an Anderson Cooper look-alike, except that he would never have a following if he continued on Fox. As a "rebel" he can still retain the eyes of skeptical, yet naive, people around the world. The Putin interview was the biggest media event perhaps of this century. TPTB were forced to abandon their old MSM news outlets and replace them with sites like Carlson. Hopefully people will see through him and begin looking for alternatives, thereby finding the honest truthseekers that populate Substack. The lies and contradictions in the mainstream narrative are becoming so obvious that the controlled opposition like Carlson are not able to sweep it away.
I watch most of Tucker's news segments and must say I think "hear! hear!" when I hear 95 percent of his monologues or interviews with his maverick guests. If I was in his place, I'd produce the exact same type segments.
So if I replaced Substack would someone say I was captured or controlled opposition? Probably so, but I wouldn't be. Even when we get a rare truth-teller, significant numbers of the "freedom movement" are certain this person is working for the other side.
It's not 3-D chess, but 4-D chess to have someone like Tucker Carlson lampooning or harpooning some bogus narratives - narratives he really doesn't believe in.
Hi,
I can confirm most of the conclusion from my readers perspective. First, there is many more channels which pop-up and people migrated. It´s Telegram, Brownstone, X, TheEpochTimes, EpochTV, UKColumn, Rumble, ZeroHedge, Expose News, WeebUnion, Vigilant News, NCI, Children's Health Defense, Corona Ausschuss, Geopolitics and Empire, Tucker Carlson, The Daily Sceptic and others. Before it was only SubStack as other platforms were not really developed yet. Also Brave Search and others allow now more content to be found on internet by default and also now we can communicate via old platforms with non-brainwashed people, so the discussion is going back and it takes a lot of time and energy.
Second is that I and probably many people have changed e-mail provider and started to remove the e-mail notifications. It´s just too many of them, so I don´t get anymore SubStack notification. The crisis is over and information overload is real. So there is need to reduce it.
Lastly, the covid is already over, now most people don´t read news but digging back into archives what really happened in last 4 years as they couldn´t access it or read it because of censorship.
I think also many people reduce their exposure to online-content and for example I have now invested in separated CD, DVD and old books from 2000. Also new Books like The Wuhan Cover-Up and I don´t really look for new content as 90% has been already said and there is nothing new, which interest me. I am only curious now how the past will be handled and the evidence is overwhelming. For anyone outside of this group, it´s enough just to share post from 2021 and everything is already there - there is so many information's, that it´s not possible to even go back and read all of this.
Also Substack shows now feed like on Twitter and basically you see mostly 10 new articles, it´s more question now to select from them and to filter the most relevant. It´s not possible to catch-up with all of the content now, as the censorship has fallen so broadly and many people are coming to understand what happened.
For me I am trying to stay updated on Substack with Coffee & Covid 2024 (https://www.coffeeandcovid.com/), Brownstone (X), The Neo-Ciceronian Times, Dr. Naomi Wolf, C.J.Hopkins, Vigilant News, The FLCCC Alliance Community, WeebUnion (Ukraine War), Toby Rogers and others but it´s already too much, just to see the new articles. I also like Telegram and X now.
I work at home and, when I'm not writing my own articles, I'm reading the articles of other people (and digging through some complex studies). But I consider this research. All these articles - and the Reader Comments - help crystalize and refine my thinking and allow me, I hope, to connect some more dots ... which will make my next articles more valuable or original.
I also make many comments at other sites, which helps market my own Substack and maybe increases my Substack "brand."
But I'm definitely atypical. Anyone with a real job can't read this number of articles. I do think there's a fair percentage of people who read two or three hours/day. I know we have cut the cord (to save on our cable bill). Time I used to spend watching TV, I now spend reading on the Internet. People who read, say, one hour/day are probably my best target market. This is probably millions of people world-wide.
You are right, it´s good but now I think it´s kind of retrospective phase with evaluating who were right and what was correct. Also economy is open again, so there is a lot of normal work, that can have also huge impact.
Just to give example - writer named THEOPHILUS CHILTON who writes The Neo-Ciceronian Times currently publish mostly articles he wrote in 2016 about the situation and what´s happening. When you just repost the article and read it now - after covid and lockdown, it´s incredibly precise and even more incredible, he saw it long time before.
https://neociceroniantimes.substack.com/p/narratives-versus-reality
It´s also interesting project Covid Timeline Wiki Project - there is author which tries to dig into archive and find articles from exact day in 2020 to see, what happened those days. https://debbielerman.substack.com/p/covid-timeline-wiki-project-february-330
And lastly, there is even TV News channel (on Belorussia TV) which even now publicly on TV state what has happened called NATO Hybrid War.
https://tube.doortofreedom.org/w/sygJC1V6jTyZ2yLeHpF9ge
https://merylnass.substack.com/p/very-important-mainstream-belarus
SubStack is good but the covid investigation has been now so wide spread, that if the new articles are not something like "Fauci is in prison" or "FBI and CIA buildings are set to fire by angry crowd" there is not much news, which could be interesting anymore. The real news is now how will be dealt with this treason and what will people do. Maybe they will do nothing and we will just move on, who knows...
Still, I do support any work, which tries to put light on this! So keep up good work! And don´t be sad if the numbers will be lower as the spring and summer is coming. I am also now going to take vacation and screw this crazy fanatics, life is good 🌷🤗