👋 Hi Reader,

I have spent an inordinate amount of time reading Matthew’s Substack ‘INTAKE’ series, and I absolutely adore what he has been writing about lately.

But one issue - INTAKE#42 - during this holiday break has particularly piqued my interest.

I had this thesis that Substack creators had always used the medium as an outlet of expression, particularly on topics which mainstream media and socials might not fan the flames on in public.

The more taboo or objectionable the topic of discussion was to keep away from socials and media, the more prevalent it would be on Substack:

Politics, CBD usage, discussing economics on adult entertainment, you name it.

But I never looked at this angle that Matthew talked about, while alluding to a now-unavailable Vulture article titled ’Should Authors be on Substack?’ and it is this:

Unfettered being the focus here, and it makes sense.

For every reasonably successful artist indulging in putting creative work out in public, the act of launching the work is hardly a linear one-shot asset: you have to keep testing ideas and experiment with different narrative structures.

Some ideas fail, some work brilliantly enough to consume entire sections in your upcoming book. All of this experimentation needs to happen outside the guardrails of control - no editor hemming and hawing over the lack of structure or grammar, no publisher overthinking elements of the book, that might pigeon-hole it into controversial areas.

Substack - it seems - becomes the perfect sandbox for such ideas for authors. They can send out feelers for the germ of a concept, they believe might work, but would still like outside opinion to help shape it. I think the attached Vulture article below captures the essence of Substack being that stomping ground for authors.

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As I mentioned above, I had never looked at Substack that way. And it makes me feel that Substack (not just Substack notes) behaves more like Instagram. Where an author can give you a curated glimpse of where their head is at, and put something which raw and unvarnished, but let discerning readers polish it with their pulse on it.

Are you one of these authors who is using Substack with this mindset at play? I would love to talk to you, and hopefully jam on it on the LetterStack pod one day.

Let me know by hitting ‘Reply’ on this email, or send a note to marketing@letterstack.co.

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