The results of the Can we read? experiment

An extra message letting you know what to expect going forward

Late this summer I came up with the weird idea to radically change the structure of subscriptions for this newsletter.

In short, I launched an experiment — running from September 1 to December 31 — to see if I could remove the paywall here, so that every post went out to every subscriber, and anyone who wanted to support my work could still do so via a paid subscription, but it would be considered a donation. That is, paid subscriptions wouldn’t be a requirement for greater or deeper access.

I defined my measure of success as a simple pass/fail — if I made the same amount of money or more here, doing it differently, it worked (pass), and if I didn’t, it didn’t (fail).

Well: it worked. I don’t know how or why — it has been a huge surprise to me, from the very first day — but the results are a clear pass.

So what does this mean for you, my subscribers?

From now on, this will be how it works:

Paid subscriptions are simply to support my work, not to receive anything extra.

Everything gets sent to everyone every week.

Nothing is paywalled.

🗒️ A note on the paywall itself: it still exists for anything that ever was paywalled to begin with. This is because there is no magic Substack button that allows me to just remove it across the board — I’d have to go back and change the settings post by post and honestly, ain’t nobody got time for that. (Okay, maybe somebody got time for that, but not me.) So only paid subscribers will be able to hop the paywall of the past.

Are there still perks for being a paid subscriber?

As we say here in Wisconsin: you betcha 🧀

In addition to full access to the archives, paid subscribers do receive some special things:

• A couple of instant downloads that are different than the ones I provide to free subscribers

• A Notion template I created that you can copy and make your own

• Complimentary access to anything I offer for sale outside this newsletter, like PDF download guides, and other things I haven’t thought up yet

• Personalized booklists for your family, classroom, or other group. This is a service available only to paid subscribers (and one that I’ll be resuming, after a short pause due to a family emergency, as of today)

Thank you for your support

However you choose to support Can we read?, whether it’s as free subscriber or a paid one, thank you. I really love doing this work — a passion project that gets done in my free time (HAHA) — and it’s incredibly rewarding for me to be able to open up this newsletter to everyone who wants to read it.

Sarah