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Create like an Icelander.

CJ Chilvers
CJ Chilvers
— 2 min read

What a month! Thanks so much for all the messages about the new book. For everyone who asked: yes, it will be available physically. I’m working on it now. Here are a few of the things I thought were worth sharing in the meantime.

  1. Dan Oshinsky of Inbox Collective was nice enough to feature 15 of the 49 lessons from my book, Principles for Newsletters. I really love the community Dan has fostered around newsletters. Subscribe to his newsletter – the newsletter of record for newsletter publishers — and check out his keynote at The Newsletter Conference on May 3 in New York City. I also posted a behind-the-scenes look at the book to answer some of your FAQs.
  2. 10% of Icelanders will publish a book in their lifetime. They claim it’s due to their love of stories, the long winters, and a love for physical media over digital. This lends some credibility to benefits we don’t often consider of physical media — like encouraging creation, project execution, and leisure time (the basis of culture) across large populations with constant, visible reinforcement.
  3. I’ve tried to avoid being the typical middle age dude who gets too into physical media. I’m not a gamer, so I never experienced the anger of buying entertainment digitally and having it deleted remotely. That would have prompted a rant much earlier. The issue hit closer to home these past few weeks, though. A few of my favorite albums were pulled from digital services or ghost-edited to include new instruments, different track orders, and terrible “remastering.” I’m deep-diving on how bad this is getting, and writing my next way-too-long essay on the subject. Until then, take it from an audiophile or two — we still don’t appreciate how good we had it before the streamers took over.
  4. Speaking of physical media that lasts, what were writers thinking about 2000 years ago? According to a scroll that’s being deciphered, they were pretty much just blogging — contemplating ideas and talking sh1t about other writers.
  5. I see so many creators obsessing over the format and design of their newsletters, instead of publishing. I checked back in with one of the most successful and respected tech newsletters. Yep, it's still as basic as hell. It's been for around for almost 700 weekly issues. There are no excuses.
  6. The off-the-grid, floating-in-a-forest, backyard design studio of Mike Matas deserves a place on our list of best garden offices. (via Ugmonk)

Thanks for reading! – CJ