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Gizmo's Tech Support Alert Newsletter Merges with Windows Secrets

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Carol Haynes:
Not being cynical but presumably the mergers (repeated mergers with various people) mean that the individuals merging their mailing list into Windows Secrets have a two fold effect:


* Brian Livingstone is happy because the circulation of WS is boosted enormously - which must have a huge impact on the saleability of advertising space
* The people merging into Windows Secrets presumably get a cut of that revenue without having to produce nearly so much copy
From all the contributors points of view it is definitely a win-win situation - especially financially.

However, from the reader perspective we get a newsletter that is at best massively reduced in content (eg. no single issue of WS has every had as much content as a normal LangaList newsletter) and at worst full of adverts (I don't know about Gizmo's TSAN but LangaList paid version didn't have ads at all) and dumbed down content - this seems pretty much to go without saying when you have read WS for a while.

tomos:
on the other hand Gizmo is the main editor now (?) sorry, make that "senior" - (not sure what that means, who's the boss?!?)

I get the feeling that Fred Langa joined WS with the intention of phasing himself out of the picture - they all made a few quid out of the deal
This I think (& hope) will be something different

J-Mac:
Carol,

I agree that a lot of the content isn't all that great, but what else is there?  Let's face it, not many - if there are any left - are going to create newsletters like the LangaList and TSA because they like it anymore.  No one is that altruistic anymore.  They want a chance to make some "real" money from their life's work and this way is probably the only way to do it.

You surely read posts above yours where someone said they drew the line at paying for the LangaList, that they only liked the free version.  A lot of people feel that way, sadly.  And I say sadly only because it stops writers like Fred from staying with their own newsletters.  I'm not trying to place blame on anyone for not wanting to pay.  But this is surely one reason that folks like Fred and Ian no longer wish to continue on their own.

Windows Secrets does definitely have too much advertising.  But I am tired of dropping newsletter and searching all over again for more "pure" ones!  THe current WS/TSA is going to have to do for me.

Jim

app103:
I'll just stick with DC's newsletter...best one of all. Never a disapppointment.  :-*

(mouser...please promise you will never merge it with WS)

Actually - that has given me an idea - why don't we all send a LangaList newsletter from the past to WS as content for the new newsletter ???? At least there would be something worth reading then even if it is only of historic interest  :Thmbsup:
-Carol Haynes (July 15, 2008, 12:06 PM)
--- End quote ---

Great idea! (I would have given a link to what was supposed to be the old premium archives, but langalist.com and those archives are gone. Only the free version archives still exist)

mouser:
J-Mac I think you made some really insightful comments, and I got the same feeling from reading the announcement that Tomos got, that there is a real difference in the way Ian is coming into it compared to Langa.  So I really think it would be a good idea to keep an open mind and give this new merger a fair chance at doing good.  The same as we would want for any of our own projects.

The DC Newsletter will not be merging into WS for a whole bunch of reasons:

* As the new privacy page says we will not share our email address with any 3rd parties.
* Our DC newsletter doesn't contain much original writing content just summaries and links to our newsletter.
* I'm afraid you guys would stage a riot.
* The DC newsletters are already too long, there doesn't seem to be much point in merging them with a bigger entity.
* It's a pain to write and send out the newsletters, but it's also a bit of fun and it's nice not being on someone else's schedule.
* I'm sure there are 10 more reasons as well.  The bottom line is that as long as this site gets enough donations to pay for server expenses and a little bit more to help offset the time spent writing stuff for the site, then we will do things here the way the members want them done.

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