I read this with pure fascination and gratitude--and imagine my delight when I saw that my Substack (Dining Well in DSM) was listed in your recommendations.

Substack has been a real boon to my food writing. I love not guessing algorithms, not chasing clicks, and never ever trying to go viral. I have plenty of paid subscribers who completely support this. The only thing that matters is them. While I like "likes," "shares," and "comments," I don't chase them. The only thing I look at is whether my readers a) open the emails, and b) renew their subscriptions. That's all I need to know to know to determine if I'm on track. It's refreshing that only the content counts, and not that weird popularity contest that social media has made of food writing.