There are a lot of great newsletters out there. These are the ones your favorite newsletter writers never miss. By Claire Zulkey and Dan Oshinsky: “We subscribe to a lot of newsletters. When you work in the newsletter space, you subscribe to just about anything that seems interesting — sometimes because you want to read it, and sometimes just to see if they’re trying anything that might be worth trying on your newsletter. But it’s rare to find a newsletter we actually want to read every single time it shows up in the inbox.
Dan, for instance, filters almost all of his newsletters into a series of folders. He only lets a handful of newsletters go straight to the primary tab of his inbox. On the days she’s behind in her newsletter inbox reading, Claire often deletes mercilessly in bulk rather than let issues pile up. The way filmmakers don’t have time to watch a lot of movies and authors don’t always have time to read, newsletter creators have a limited time per day to read other newsletters.
However, most have their longtime (or even of-the-moment) favorites. Over the past year, we asked newsletter writers, editors, and operators what they often make time to read and why. We’ll start with our favorites — then we’ll share what others always make time for. (We asked everyone for one newsletter, but some chose to share three or four. More than a handful of writers told us that picking just one felt like picking among their children. We get it — so we’re including all of their picks below!)”
Claire Zulkey
Creator, Evil Witches
I nearly always take the time to open and skim Rusty Foster’s Today in Tabs. It gives me a feel for what media/tech/intelligent people care about at the moment with a pithy take that’s irreverent without trying too hard to be edgy. (It probably helps that Rusty is a middle-aged father, so he knows the limits of trying too hard to go for the hot take.) It’s always witty in a way that’s online but doesn’t feel like it’s trying too hard to appeal to the very online, which can be a tricky line to toe.