wow my 3 fave substack authors in one chat :) Charlie, when I first started writing a year ago you were my first motivator on Substack as I - coming from tech and similarly gobsmacked by AI - couldn't learn enough. @whytryai came soon after.
fwiw coming from a smol pub I don't think Substack's beat you on the head consistency message is all that critical. As long as you keep putting out good content weekly your audience and impact will continue to grow.
One thing I wonder for you guys as I look at the increasingly crowded and noisy space of AI pubs is how you stand out or differentiate? I think that's both your oppty and risk to grow the newsletter into something more.
Thank you so much for the kind words, Andrew! And I actually think putting out content once a week extremely consistent! I take it a little bit further and commit to specific days, but I've met many authors who find a weekly cadence to be a tall order.
I agree with your points about differentiation. I think in my case, my strengths are my technical background and startup experience, so there's probably something in there that I should lean into.
I think you've hit the nail on the head. When I first started out in August 2022, I was one of very few people playing around with text-to-image. But ChatGPT changed the space massively. Now we've got thousands of AI newsletters, so finding an angle that's uniquely yours is trickier.
10,000 subscribers is fantastic, Charlie! Congratulations, even if gaining subscribers or getting eyes on your stuff initially was not the main goal.
Very much like you, I learn by writing and researching, and I'm really motivated to get the facts right! Even better, a consistent group of folks who are willing to read my stuff and give me some feedback (or, more often, just bring the conversation further forward) is out there ready to help me every time. We both have that from what we're doing, and that's so cool.
Keep on rockin', and if there's anything I can help with, just gimme a shout! Very well done.
Most pieces are probably in the range of 500 words, so that comes out to 3500 words per week. It could be a hair more - sometimes I get a little wordy, but am trying to appreciate that less is often more.
First off, massive congrats on the 10K milestone! You consistently offer some of the most lucid and thoughtful commentary on AI, so it's definitely well deserved.
I'm in the same boat as you with regards to the schedule. I like the consistency, but I have been wondering whether to build in some flexibility in terms of day-of-week scheduling.
Some thoughts on potential bonus things for paid subscribers and collaboration opportunities:
1. I think focused workshops have very strong potential. By focused I mean something like "How to do X with tool Y" - so it's not just yet another vague walkthrough of an AI tool but a deep dive into how it solves a specific real-world problem. The tricky part here is first figuring out what the "task X" and "tool Y" should be - what are people actually interested in using AI for? But that could be a poll, etc.
2. I also feel there's a shortage of content that looks at how people actually build something worthwhile with AI. (That goes for me, too - I normally focus on hypothetical applications rather than actual use cases.) So a cool project could be for you to, perhaps collaboratively, build a useful app or incorporate AI into a specific useful product, etc. A sort of "building in public" approach that showcases what AI is actually capable of.
As you know, I'd love to collaborate with you if you do end up doing either of the above (or something else for that matter). I've been talking about collaborative projects for a while but haven't been particularly good at narrowing down the scope and taking action.
wow my 3 fave substack authors in one chat :) Charlie, when I first started writing a year ago you were my first motivator on Substack as I - coming from tech and similarly gobsmacked by AI - couldn't learn enough. @whytryai came soon after.
fwiw coming from a smol pub I don't think Substack's beat you on the head consistency message is all that critical. As long as you keep putting out good content weekly your audience and impact will continue to grow.
One thing I wonder for you guys as I look at the increasingly crowded and noisy space of AI pubs is how you stand out or differentiate? I think that's both your oppty and risk to grow the newsletter into something more.
Thank you so much for the kind words, Andrew! And I actually think putting out content once a week extremely consistent! I take it a little bit further and commit to specific days, but I've met many authors who find a weekly cadence to be a tall order.
I agree with your points about differentiation. I think in my case, my strengths are my technical background and startup experience, so there's probably something in there that I should lean into.
I think you've hit the nail on the head. When I first started out in August 2022, I was one of very few people playing around with text-to-image. But ChatGPT changed the space massively. Now we've got thousands of AI newsletters, so finding an angle that's uniquely yours is trickier.
10,000 subscribers is fantastic, Charlie! Congratulations, even if gaining subscribers or getting eyes on your stuff initially was not the main goal.
Very much like you, I learn by writing and researching, and I'm really motivated to get the facts right! Even better, a consistent group of folks who are willing to read my stuff and give me some feedback (or, more often, just bring the conversation further forward) is out there ready to help me every time. We both have that from what we're doing, and that's so cool.
Keep on rockin', and if there's anything I can help with, just gimme a shout! Very well done.
Thanks Andrew! I'm curious - how many words a week do you think you write? You're always so consistent with both publishing and commenting.
Most pieces are probably in the range of 500 words, so that comes out to 3500 words per week. It could be a hair more - sometimes I get a little wordy, but am trying to appreciate that less is often more.
First off, massive congrats on the 10K milestone! You consistently offer some of the most lucid and thoughtful commentary on AI, so it's definitely well deserved.
I'm in the same boat as you with regards to the schedule. I like the consistency, but I have been wondering whether to build in some flexibility in terms of day-of-week scheduling.
Some thoughts on potential bonus things for paid subscribers and collaboration opportunities:
1. I think focused workshops have very strong potential. By focused I mean something like "How to do X with tool Y" - so it's not just yet another vague walkthrough of an AI tool but a deep dive into how it solves a specific real-world problem. The tricky part here is first figuring out what the "task X" and "tool Y" should be - what are people actually interested in using AI for? But that could be a poll, etc.
2. I also feel there's a shortage of content that looks at how people actually build something worthwhile with AI. (That goes for me, too - I normally focus on hypothetical applications rather than actual use cases.) So a cool project could be for you to, perhaps collaboratively, build a useful app or incorporate AI into a specific useful product, etc. A sort of "building in public" approach that showcases what AI is actually capable of.
As you know, I'd love to collaborate with you if you do end up doing either of the above (or something else for that matter). I've been talking about collaborative projects for a while but haven't been particularly good at narrowing down the scope and taking action.
But if you're open to it, let's talk again!
I like the focused workshop suggestion! Maybe we should find some time and brainstorm ideas that would work well for that format.
Agreed. I can jot down some thoughts and send them your way, then we can take it from there.
I'd appreciate that, thanks Daniel!
Congrats! One of the best round-up of AI out there on the interwebs.
Thanks Parves! I feel like I could learn a thing or two from you on building Linkedin/Twitter audiences these days.