Why newsletters are the best form of social media: “You don’t have to fight an algorithm to reach your audience”

In The New York Times, Mike Isaac explains why newsletters are a better way of communicating than Facebook and Twitter.

For me, the change has happened slowly but the reasons for it were unmistakable. Every time I was on Twitter, I felt worse. I worried about being too connected to my phone, too wrapped up in the latest Twitter dunks. A colleague created his own digital detox program to reduce his smartphone addiction. I reckon he made the right choice.

Now, when I feel the urge to tweet an idea that I think is worth expounding on, I save it for my newsletter, The Dump (an accurate description of what spills out of my head). It's much more fun than mediating political fights between relatives on my Facebook page or decoding the latest Twitter dust-up.

I agree with Mike. Platforms like Google, Facebook, and Twitter control every aspect of your communication. As centralized proprietary platforms, they own your content and your audience. They can deplatform you with the push of a button and permanently cut you off from a readership or viewership you've spent years to cultivate. With a newsletter, you have the email addresses of all your subscribers. Newsletters are so much better than Facebook I'm surprised Zuckerberg isn't lobbying Congress to ban them.

Speaking of newsletters, you should check out Boing Boing's newsletter! I also have a couple of newsletters you might be interested in: Recomendo, a weekly newsletter with 6 short tips and recommendations, and Book Freak, a weekly newsletter with useful quotations from books I've read.