I just got the ‘How to stop being boring’ email from Joan’s regular email address. Three minutes later, I got an email from a hashed Substack address with an opening teaser and an invite to read the same post on, well, Substack. I suspect I’m not the only one in this situation. Just the only one sitting at a screen with nothing better to do than post/reply here! Maybe I’m bored, or boring, or both!
So I’m imagining this could be:
a plan reminiscent of the quip popularized by comedian David Letterman (about New York, NY) that these are “Newsletters so good they should be read twice”; or
the start of a transition of the newsletter entirely to Substack; or
an inadvertent dump of email addresses from one directory to another.
Ironically I closed my Substack account in the aftermath of some of Joan’s musings about minimizing one’s digital footprint and in particular of saving all sorts of things to read later that never get read!
It may just be a mistake. I see on Substack that @joanwestenberg has three newsletters there — this one, another called Studio Self, a third called Pizza Party which is a webcomic — and the only subscriber-locked post is “How to stop being boring”.
On the other hand, there is a paid plan, which I think subscribes you to all three. And the plan costs $5/mo or $30/yr, twice the cost of subscribing through her website. So paid access may be evolving.
In any case, Joan’s recent “notes” on Substack suggest that she’s been very busy lately, lots of non-newsletter irons in the fire. She’ll probably turn her attention back to this forum soon enough and let us know what’s going on. Meanwhile I’m glad to occupy myself hearing what folks here have to say!