Each Tuesday for the last three years, I have shared Studio Notebook with you. And now, one of my biggest experiments is coming to an end.

It’s been a great success — and you are the reason it has. Knowing that you are interested enough in my work, my ideas, and my dad jokes to fork over a few bucks each month has been so encouraging.

The Internet has been revolutionary — giving anyone with a computer and an Internet connection the opportunity to reach people all around the world in an instant.

It has also irreversibly changed the relationship between publishing ideas and money.

We now take for granted that all content is free of charge, giving little thought to how it’s subsidized. But of course, we pay a price for free stuff. As a wise blogger once said, “If you're not paying for the product, you are the product.”

That’s one of the reasons I stopped writing on social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram; I was tired of my ideas being used as chum for advertisers.

And that’s why I so appreciate your willingness to pay for something that could have just as well been free.
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I started writing my free essays a few months before the pandemic. I never expected that so many people would be interested in subscribing, but I am very gratified that they did. Of course, while the essays are free for subscribers, I pay thousands to Kit, my email service, to send out nearly 30,000 emails a week.

But that’s not why I decided to start a paid subscription option. I never did it for the money.
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This experiment has been about what I want to write. And for who.

I figured that if a certain group of people was interested enough to pay for my work, they would be self-selecting as the most engaged of my readers. I could make and share ideas freely, knowing I was in a safe space to do so, supported by folks willing to be my patrons. I could be most myself around you.
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For the first year or so, I wrote Tuesday essays that were in the vein of my Friday essays. Some were longer, franker, and more experimental, but there was no clear distinction between the two newsletters. It was just more of the same.

In the spring of ’23, I decided to steer Studio Notebook into its own clearly marked lane. I would focus on the process of making and sharing the tools and strategies I use. I divided each month into four categories: a sketchbook tour, a review of art supplies, a list of discoveries and recommendations, and the results of a creative experiment.

The structure also made it easier for me to know what to write: each Monday, I had a defined assignment when I sat down to write.

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A few months ago, I began to review the results of this experiment.

Was it working for me? Was it working for you?

I’ll start with you. To clarify how useful the Notebook is to readers, I looked at the statistics. 85% of readers open each essay, (which means 15% pay for but don’t bother to read them). When I share links, around a quarter of readers click on any of them. On average, 1% of readers write back in response to most weeks’ essays to tell me what they thought.

This is all a pretty standard response rate for newsletters — we are all busy and distracted, and I assume you are enjoying the Notebook in a way that works for you. All good. You are engaged and willing to remain subscribed and to keep supporting me.

But enough about you. Let me talk about me 😉.

Since I began Studio Notebook, my perspective has changed. First, money is not the insightful indicator I had assumed. While your support has been so encouraging, your $7 isn’t the reason I do this—and it shouldn’t be.

In fact, money can be an obstacle to making stuff. When artists are forced to focus on revenue, they start creating work to serve the whims of the market rather than their authentic direction. While the two may sometimes converge, when they differ, the market’s expectations tend to win out. If I worry too much about what readers want, I tend to forget what I want, which is the whole point, at least to me.

However, I realized I had Increasingly started to feel a strong sense of obligation to the format and schedule I had set up. Every week, I felt I had to write about one of these four things, rain or shine. I no longer felt particularly free or authentic.

I know you didn’t insist on this. But my monkey did. And he’s not even a paid subscriber.

I've reached a simple conclusion. While I wasn’t sure whether I still loved writing the Studio Notebook, I was sure I didn’t love the sense of restriction and obligation it had become.

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And besides, I have so many other things to do.

I love making stuff for YouTube, and I have an idea list of at least a hundred videos I want to make.

I want to devote more time to writing my regular Friday essays.

I am excited about creating online courses again. I can’t wait to launch The Creative License, and I have lots of ideas for future ones.

I have a growing list of new things I want to learn — animation, music, cooking, gardening, pug training — and I need the time to learn them.

I want to spend more time looking after my health and fitness.

And, having reached 64, I want to make sure that I use my every remaining day just the way I want to use it. (My father died a couple of months ago, a reminder of my own ticking clock).

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I have loved writing the Studio Notebook.

I have learned a huge amount from the project, and I am so proud of the hundred and fifty issues I have published.

Thank you so much for being a part of it and for supporting me. It’s meant the world to me.

See you on Friday!

Your pal,

Danny