Rumination
The subtitle?
Fifteen Years on the Hurricane Deck of a Spanish Pony
Been more than 30 years, mostly crisscrossing Texas, but occasional jaunts elsewhere, work, and whatnot. Less of a memory, and more about a few things I’ve learned along the way. One author, I really enjoy her material, wrote about having a few paid subscribers to her Sub-Stack thing.
- Right there, that is the problem.
Handful of paid subscribers, what I wound up with after the pandemic set in, and gradually I let the push for paid subscriptions sunset. I understand that it is a viable option for some, but the current attention span of paying customers runs to fifteen minutes or less, especially on social media, whatever that looks like.
The problem with AI is that it is “regenerative,” as in it can only use existing material and then draw apparently logical conclusions, reconstructions of material that is always already present. Won’t work for my style of horoscope or astrology reading. Most AI won’t be prescient.
There are a couple of iterations of substack and its competitors. What it is? E-Mail. Plain, simple, e-mail delivery of data points, and then the idea of paid subscription, or donation based, or whatever. That model and its process is eerily similar.
Last couple of years, my clients and consultations essentially paid for the whole of my arrangements. However, as I often learn, the kindness of strangers is not always dependable.
C’est la vie.
However, I’m less interested in paid subscription styles, and more interested in just doing the parts I enjoy the most.
- Writing
(Blurred and subdivided into blog, metafiction, journals, stories, tales, and horoscopes.)
- Personal consultations
It’s very simple.
The horoscopes entertain me, and I enjoy the labor, mostly.
When I closely tracked such matters, the horoscopes attracted at least ten times more attention than any other of my works, combined. Good thing it’s also the most enjoyable.
Rumination
With the backend digital details I keep one hand in the world of the computers, and their ilk, design, implementation, purpose-driven ideas and ideals. Writing is the first part, as is the rest, usually a challenge, if one would call it that.
Ethos, ethics, and political disputes abound. I’m interested in structure, “What’s under the hood,” in a manner of speaking.
The short version is that I like being the sole operator, from end-to-end. Makes it a lot easier when assessing blame, also make it much easier to fix, since I can only question my own motives.
Rumination
A singular lesson learned in the last years, a poignant example? As a solo operator, if I want to change to something, besides the committee in my mind, I just change it. Don’t like the color scheme? Switch it.
In some more structured hierarchies, though, think bureaucracy, such a change requires a committee, then an executive function, perhaps a board meeting. It can take anywhere from a few days up to a year or more to “rebrand,” or even do something as simple as change a color scheme.
What I did learn is that people — like me — who are basically self-employed? We don’t have to contact the right department, or the correct people, in order to change some aspect of the business.
Flick a switch. Push a button. Click with a mouse. Done.
Rumination
Then there is the personal touch. That’s part of what the sub-stack versions offer, but adding another service to my less-crowded offerings is too much — for me.
It’s simple: a mailing list, goes out about once a week.
