I started my newsletter, "A Generalist", 3 years back, writing inconsistently. I made it on Substack and am still happy with it. Now, I have around 1600 subscribers. I am grateful for everyone subscribing and reading it. But (yes, real talks start from but), having an audience is also a curse. These days, everyone is also having newsletter fatigue.
Initially, I used to dump whatever I was thinking about, but now I feel it might serve my audience. I became conscious of my writing and what to share and what not to share. I lost my touch and started to write for my audience. I found myself becoming overly conscious of metrics like open rates and engagement.
Initially, I used to dump whatever I was thinking about, but now I feel it might serve my audience. I became conscious of my writing and what to share and what not to share. I lost my touch and started to write for my audience. I found myself becoming overly conscious of metrics like open rates and engagement.
This shift in focus began to influence my writing, pushing me away from my authentic voice. I am being brutally honest here.
I have started to write for my audience, which is okay, but I still want to share my personal notes/writing somewhere.
I thought about starting another substack, but it's too much work. I don't want to repeat the same story as what happened with my newsletter. I'm not interested in dashboards, likes, open rates, or any kind of metrics. I just want to write and publish it fast. I also explored Ghost and Medium, but I DO NOT align with their philosophy. These platforms lock you into their platform. Do check out File over app if you want to understand my concerns more deeply.
I have been reading Jason's blogs at Hey World, and this looks so cool. Since I am already a paying customer for Hey and love their ethos, I will use Hey World to host my personal notes.
Why write and share with the world?
Writing = thinking.
It is a form of meditation; the more you practice it, the more benefits you reap.
Yeah, I might not have Paul Graham or Jason Fried flair when writing, but they also started somewhere. I think Jason also admitted that his writing sucked in the early.
It is a form of meditation; the more you practice it, the more benefits you reap.
Yeah, I might not have Paul Graham or Jason Fried flair when writing, but they also started somewhere. I think Jason also admitted that his writing sucked in the early.
The most important step is to START.
And, with the beauty of the Internet, if you consistently share your writing with the world, who knows what opportunity might come your way? I believe in learning and building in public, and it has brought me clients and users and made me so many friends across the globe.
Writing and sharing with the world is a long term positive sum game.
How do we publish with Hey world?
Just open my Hey email -> compose new mail -> write, put the recipient as world.hey.com, and send. That's all. No templates, fancy formatting, or tens of CTAs (we all can admit how much we hate "subscribe to my newsletter box").
Just pure writing. The constraints are design decisions to help people like to focus on writing and forgo everything that is not writing.
And Hey (no pun intended), Basecamp has an until the end of the internet policy, unlike Google, which kills its products every now and then; I am assured that Hey World will be there till last paying customer.
In the coming weeks, I'll use Hey World for my personal writing/notes.
- Shivam