Decoding Everything Is Leaving Substack

Come join us on Ghost!

Photo by Febe Vanermen on Unsplash

TL;DR - Decoding Everything has moved off Substack and is now on Ghost, a non-profit open source publishing platform. Everything else about the newsletter is staying pretty much the same. If you’re a subscriber, you’re automatically subscribed to the Ghost version of this newsletter and you should’ve already received our last couple editions in your inbox. If not, please check your Spam folders.

Over the last few years, I’ve been energized and excited by the prospect of building a newsletter that gives people direct access to my work. In a world where billionaires can literally buy up social media companies and change algorithms to suit their whims, having a list of subscribers that I can reach via email was a refreshing change of pace.

I initially thought that Substack might be a great place to host a newsletter and own my relationship with my followers. After all, Substack advertised themselves as such and touted their opposition to the algorithmic quagmire of modern social platforms. Substack is also incredibly easy to use; it takes just minutes to set up a new website and get to writing. Plus, in the early days there were great network effects with writers being able to Recommend other writers and build all of our followings together.

But it’s become clear that Substack is no safe haven for writers. By now, many folks have already done a better job than I can of explaining Substack’s considerable shortcomings. My own issues can be summed up in two bullet points:

• Substack hosts and distributes free newsletters like mine at no cost to me (for now): Newsletters like Decoding Everything currently pay zero dollars for image/video hosting, not to mention all the emails that get sent out. While that might sound like a great deal, all this stuff is actually costing Substack money so it’s grossly unsustainable to conduct business in this way. It’s almost certain the experience for free newsletters like mine will be degraded at some point soon — especially given Substack just took a huge round of VC funding — and I don’t intend to stick around long enough to see that how that happens.

• Substack as a company frequently does objectionable things and then makes things worse through how it communicates about them: From their legendary Decoder interview to their recent push notification fiasco (both just the tip of the iceberg, mind you), Substack has consistently made terrible decisions, then exacerbated the situation with clunky ham-handed communication that does zero to assuage people’s concerns. This makes Substack a polarizing company that people now have strong feelings about. I just want a place to host my newsletters, man.

Anyway, I’ve moved over to Ghost and I hope you’ll join me there at DecodingEverything.com! If you’re not already subscribed, you can do so today. I’ll be leaving this Substack up for archival purposes but otherwise there will be no new updates here.

Some quick FAQ:

Q. Do I need to re-subscribe to the newsletter?

Almost definitely not! A couple weeks ago, I took a list of all Decoding Everything subscribers and added them to my Ghost email subscriber list. That said, if you subscribed very recently, it’s possible you aren’t subscribed. So if you didn’t get this other email from us today, be sure to subscribe at DecodingEverything.com or check your spam folders.

Q. Can I still post comments on the newsletter?

Yes, but you’ll need to sign up/sign in at the new site in order to do so.

Q. Wait, don’t you host Decoding TV on Substack as well?

Yes, and I’m currently working on figuring out an alternative to that. It’s much more challenging because Decoding TV is not just a newsletter but also a podcast with premium content. Very few solutions exist that can provide both in a robust fashion. Stay tuned!