Programming Notes: Changes to Five Studies About+ and Scheduling
More access for free subscribers and a different approach to scheduling posts
Hello!
I have three things to announce.
1. The paywall in Five Studies About+ is moving down below the first study
As you may have noticed, I’m publishing two editions of Five Studies About this season (Season 3). The first is the Five Studies About that long-time readers are familiar with: a list of five recent studies about a specific crime or criminal justice topic. So far this season, we’ve had the following FSA posts:
Note that the article headlines highlight the first study of the five listed in the post.
The other type of FSA, Five Studies About+, are paid posts that resemble the free FSA posts, but with something extra. Each of the five studies in these posts includes two quotations from the study that summarize what the researchers were trying to find and what they found. (Sometimes I add a sentence or two commentary.)
Until today, these posts had paywalls that came before the studies. If you’re not a paid subscriber, you get to read the first several paragraphs, but are then greated with this:
It hit me on the way home from driving my wife to work today. (I think about the newsletter all the time.)
Free subscribers get no pay-off from clicking through after reading the headline (or subject line, if you’re reading in email). They (you) get no value.
I’ve made a type of promise with the headline, but I’m not fulfilling it.
That sucks.
Also, from a business of writing standpoint, what’s the point of a preview if there’s no value for the reader? I can’t give it all away, but I’m probably just frustrating free readers and training them not to read my stuff.
That’s why I’ve just gone back to the FSA+ posts I’ve already published and moved the paywall down under the first study in each. Now you can get what I promise in the headline:
This is what I’ll do going forward with FSA+ posts.
2. Crime Research Update will continue with a set publication date (Mondays), but everything else will be published without set publication dates
Crime Research Update, Five Studies About, Five Studies About+, and the forthcoming theory series (more on that in a moment) were originally planned for Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and alternating Thursdays respectively.
No more.
My physical limitations, which I’ve written about elsewhere, include chronic pain and severe energy and concentration constraints. I can only do the work for short periods of time. Creating this content comes with a cost to me, paid in pain. (As I write this, the pain levels in my head and neck are rising. I’ll need to tend to those shortly.) I’m not aiming for sympathy (yuck), just transparency about why I’m deviating from my original publication schedule.
Instead, I commit to the following for the remainder of Season 3:
I will publish Crime Research Update on Mondays.
I will publish one edition each of Five Studies About and Five Studies About+ at some point between Mondays and Fridays (inclusive).
I will publish the theory series posts (again, more on these in a moment) every other week, with a target of Thursdays.
I wish I could be more consistent and predictable, but for the moment, this is what I can do.
3. The criminology theory series is still happening
I had planned to have published the first few installments of this series by now. Obviously, I haven’t, for reasons related to Announcement #2’s reasons, but also because I underestimated the size of the assignment I gave myself.
Oops.
Watch for the first installment this week.
And that’s the state of the union. I’m making these changes to better serve you and the work, without burning out.
If any of these changes raises questions of any kind, please let me know! I love hearing from you.
If you haven’t subscribed yet, you should! Also, please consider becoming a paid subscriber.
If you’re already a paid subscriber, thanks so much. I appreciate you more than you might suppose.