Don’t wanna start any argument about this but I don’t think I ever wanted to read a single email newsletter, whatever it is I want to read, I read it somewhere else.
That’s ok. I subscribed enthusiastically to a bunch of Substack ones last year only to discover that they all were pretty awful save for one. But stuff like The Marginalian and Metafilter and a few others are honestly worthwhile.
That’s what I’m finding too, a lot of them give you just a couple paragraphs and then demand a subscription to keep reading. I’m all for supporting creators but a lot of substacks are so aggressive with it.
With the enshittification of the rest of the internet, I’m starting to welcome simple email and rss feeds.
Fair point. I guess so much of it is spam so I never been exposed to actually worth it newsletter.
I maintain a list of the tech and creator newsletters I subscribe to.
When ChatGPT and LLMs started to become mainstream, many poor-quality newsletters about AI appeared and/or with the sole purpose of embedding advertisements in emails.
I found a quality newsletter, genuinely made by those interested in the subject, with updated news, containing reference links, and without advertisements.
Free daily (M-W-F) news email. Tuesdays and Thursdays are for paying subs, $5 per month.
I get email updates from brr.fyi, which is a fascinating website about a person’s experiences and observations living in Antarctica. Every time I get an email I pretty much immediately go read the new post. They are always super interesting.
Ok that sounds interesting as hell and I’m subscribing.
Readtangle.com. No matter what your political leanings are, it will get you out of your news bubble.
Serious news about the (serious) longevity businesses and research.
If you are interested in manufacturing and logistics Scope of Work (https://www.scopeofwork.net) is a pretty interesting weekly email.
It is paid, but Stratechery (https://stratechery.com) has interesting analysis in the world of tech.
Matt Levine’s Money Stuff is awesome if you’re at all interested in finance. It’s kind off a offbeat take on things and really delves into the weirdness of financial fraud, crypto and Elon Musk, among other things.
Of those I subscribe to, a few I don’t miss reading:
- https://www.the-syllabus.com/ - A curated selection of articles and videos. Broad, it covers politics, tech, etc through careful journalism, papers and talks.
- https://www.aisnakeoil.com/ - Commentary and chapters from a forthcoming textbook. Tired of all the lazy hype so this is nice to read. By Arvind Narayanan (the PL researcher) and an AI PhD student.
- https://www.carbonbrief.org/ - Weekly summary of climate stuff, something important but Im too lazy to properly follow news.
