Everything is Subject to Change
Welcome to my new format! I'm still working out a few details but I didn't want to delay in getting things up and running. The next newsletter might look a bit different as I tweak things, but the details will still be the same.
As most of us tend to do with boilerplate emails, I ignored one I got back in October that was about Mailchimp's changes to their Standard Terms of Use. (Both South Park and Black Mirror have addressed terms and conditions, and I've seen both episodes. You'd think I'd know better by now.)
When I got an email that the monthly fee was going up, and I noticed my user dashboard changed to include prompts with a whole lot of marketing jargon and new AI tools, I started questioning sticking around.
Does Mailchimp work? Yes. Do the fees I'm paying align with what I'm using it for? No. It's akin to paying for 2 hours on the parking meter when dinner might only take an hour or hour and a half. Most folks are okay with overpaying because they don't want to get up and plug the meter, but they don't love that they're possibly spending more than they need to. (I recognize that this is a relatively outdated analogy since a lot of areas have app-based parking now, which is awesome.)
When I happened to learn about Buttondown (thank you, Andy) and then read this post, I was able to get off the fence.
I went back and read the Terms of Use email I had ignored, and my understanding is since I didn't use any of Mailchimp's AI tools, they didn't scrape anyone's data. However, just as I don't want to be on a platform that's fine with taking money from Nazis, I don't want to use a service that's fine with tracking someone's every digital move for the sake of bombarding them with more ads along with using my content to improve their AI.
Admittedly it's a little tough to relinquish a lot of the bells and whistles I've come to enjoy, like templates, drag and drop design, and pre-made buttons. However as a designer and an artist, I feel I have a responsibility to place ethics over aesthetics.
Even though it's only your name and email, it's still your data and you've entrusted me with that. Keeping it safe is more important to me than being fancy. Not to mention if I'm concerned that my emails being less snazzy will mean people won't read them, then I need to do some work on coming up with writing that's worthy of reading!
On a separate but related note, I'll also be leaving Patreon at the end of the month for similar reasons. The percentage of my earnings that they take is too high for what I use the service for and they lock down features like annual subscriptions until specific benchmarks are reached. Buttondown allows me to offer subscriptions/memberships with no restrictions and only charges a credit card fee via Stripe.
I completely understand needing to charge to run a platform, and I'm absolutely willing to pay when it's a good fit for me. However a lot of the services that exist now are hyper-focused on growth and AI and that just doesn't align with how I want to run my business.
And so, in the spirit of resisting (resist being my word of the year), I'm resisting the endless prodding to mirror the actions of Fortune 500 companies. In addition, I'm resisting the push to maneuver at breakneck speed. As I pivot towards new endeavors, I recognize that I need to slow down considerably and move more deliberately.
What are these new endeavors?
I hopefully will have this announcement ready at the beginning of February, which is, astonishingly, next week. (If you're a patron, you've already been clued in!)
Until the next newsletter, be well.
Giesla
If you'd like to show your appreciation for my work at any time, you can buy me a coffee!
