Paid subscriptions, mini-milestones and introducing guest posts!
Don't worry, you can still read most of The Other Maine for free!
Hello readers!
The Other Maine is four months old this week! If it was a baby, it would be holding its head up and grabbing at your hair. If it was a dating partner, it would be debating if it should introduce you to its parents. If it was a ham sandwich, it would be absolutely covered in mold.
Writing this newsletter has been a joy. The encouragement I’ve gotten from friends and strangers alike has been exciting and gratifying, and quite frankly, it makes me a bit verklempt at times. Between writing personal essays, exploring Maine history and culture, giving you the scoop on the coolest things to do in eastern Maine, interviewing fascinating people and finally putting my fiction out there, it’s the best thing I’ve done in years. I love this state, and I love telling its stories, both real and imagined. I’m all in.
That’s why this week, I’m finally launching paid subscriptions. So far, readers have been encouraged to pledge a paid subscription, indicating that you like this whole thing and want to support it. Starting today, pledges will be replaced with paid subs. A paid subscription will be $6 per month, or $70 for a full year. It’s not that high of a price point - at least, I don’t think so! - but it’s enough that it will help me make this newsletter sustainable, and allow it to grow. I put a lot of work into this thing, and just like L’Oreal hair dye, I think I’m worth it.
How will that affect subscribers that aren’t paid? For now: not at all. I don’t intend on putting anything new behind a paywall. For me, it’s not worth it to restrict access to what I write simply because you’re not ready to go in on a paid sub, or aren’t able to. I want people to read it, primarily. I want more people to join me. Making it inaccessible to anyone that isn’t coughing up six bucks a month doesn’t achieve that goal. I want to earn your support, not force you into it.
That said, I will be making posts that are six weeks old or older only readable for subscribers both paid and free. If you’re willing to dig through the archive, you should just sign up!
If you like what I write and want to see more of it, here is my humble request to consider becoming a paid subscriber. Your support allows me to do this work – work that I truly love doing, and that I genuinely hope people enjoy and find useful, illuminating and fun.
To those that have already pledged a subscription: thank you, thank you, thank you. You are literally the reason we’re at this point now! Here’s what some of them had to say:
As part of this big (ok, big for me) announcement, this week I’m also launching guest posts! Stay tuned for semi-regular posts from Maine voices both familiar and new, in a variety of formats and hailing from many different parts of this state. We’ve got some very cool things in the works, and I’m super excited to start rolling them out. Got a cool idea for a story? You know where to find me. My door is always open.
I’m so grateful to you all for being a part of this thing. I love it when you email or leave a comment with your stories, suggestions, hot tips, pitches, clean jokes, dirty jokes, gossip, insight, recommendations and anything else even remotely related to the great state of Maine and everything and everybody in it.
OK, that’s enough from me this morning. Thanks for reading my spiel. Onward!
Emily